Twelve Days of Christmas
by DancingKitKat
Summary: Tinsel mishaps, Christmas trees, gift shopping, annoying boys, lots of sugar - all are the mark of Christmas in Radiator Springs. Kelly Stoner Hudson is back with the rest of the gang as they all prepare for the most wonderful time of the year. Lots of fluff and craziness (well, duh, Kelly, Shannon, and everyone else are in it), but still rated K just because I'm paranoid.
1. Chapter 1: Day One

Hey guys! Here's the Christmas story I said I'd write, and as promised, Kelly's in it! It's kinda like Spooked - humanized, Doc is younger, around his mid-thirties or forties, Doc adopted Kelly when she was six, and Shannon and Andrea are in it. Unlike Spooked, there are no demonic ghosts that take joy in scaring the crap out of 'innocent' fifteen-year-olds (sorry... You'll just have to wait till next October. *evil, knowing smirk*), and Kelly, Shannon, and Andrea are fourteen instead of fifteen.

Hope you guys all like this! :D

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**Sunday, December 14, 2014 - Eleven Days Until Christmas**

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**Kelly's P.O.V.**

Most mornings, I wake up to Jimmy Hendrix, a rousing rendition of Reveille, and the yells of "Will you turn that disrespectful junk off?!" and "Respect the classics, man! It's Hendrix!" Today, I woke up to "_Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way!_", Reveille, and "Will you turn that disrespectful junk off?!" and "Respect the classics, man! It's Jingle Bells!"

I chuckled sleepily and glanced at the clock, even though I knew perfectly well what time it was. Six o'clock. Of course. I had never set an alarm clock before in my life - I had always had Fillmore and Sarge to wake me up promptly at seven o'clock a.m. ever since Doc adopted me when I was six, and before then, my natural six-year-old genes would wake me up at five thirty in the morning. Course, now I was fourteen, and would love to get up at ten in the morning, but between school and the bickering soldier and hippie, that was not going to happen.

I rolled over. Might as well get up then. I nearly fell on the floor in my sleepy state, but I threw my arms out to the ground and just barely saved myself. My arms were holding me up off the ground, but my legs were still tangled up in the blankets. I sighed and rolled my eyes, mentally blaming Fillmore and Sarge for the mess.

I wasn't entirely sure of how to get myself out of this mess I had gotten myself in. I tried to push myself up back on the bed, but my legs were tied in such a funky position, I couldn't do it. Eventually, I had no choice but to roll out of the bed and onto the floor. I was lowering myself gently and slowly to the floor when my hand slipped on the rug I had on the wooden floor next to my bed. The rug slid away, along with my hand, and with a loud THUMP! I crashed onto the floor. "Argh!" I yelped as I twisted around, trying to get out of the blanket's tight grip.

A minute later, Doc jogged in, holding a cup of coffee. "What happened?" he asked, confused and maybe slightly worried, but that faded once he grasped the situation. He looked at me in amusement as I struggled with my blanket.

"Um... I don't really know," I confessed. Doc chuckled, and shaking his head, walked out the room. "Hey, uh, a little help, please?"

No reply. "THANKS!" I shouted sarcastically. After a minute or two, I finally untangled myself from my blankets. "HA! Take that, ya stupid blanket!"

I heard Doc chuckling from the kitchen. I snorted in dissatisfaction as I stood up and put my bed back together. I stretched and walked into my bathroom to get ready. As usual, my hair was a rat's nest, but only took a minute to comb. Wow, that must be a world record or something for me...

Ten minutes later, I walked into the kitchen. "Thanks for the help in there," I complained as Doc sipped his coffee, reading the morning paper. He chuckled again. "Stop laughing, it isn't funny," I scolded him as I cracked a grin and giggled a bit myself.

"You're very convincing," Doc commented. I laughed.

"Hey, I haven't had caffeine yet," I teased.

"And you aren't getting any, either," Doc shot back. My mouth fell open in shock, as if this wasn't the same exchange we had had almost every morning for the past seven months.

"Awww."

"Sorry, kiddo."

"I'll satisfy myself with a donut," I reasoned as I raided my wallet, which was sitting on the counter (I should probably put it somewhere safer, in case Lightning comes over... No, I'm joking. He has enough cash of his own), and headed towards the door. "I'll be right back, going to Flo's."

"Wear a coat!" Doc shouted as I slipped on my Converse. I snorted.

"Pfft, this is the desert, not Colorado. I don't need a coat!" I replied as I walked out the door. I got about five feet before the blustery wind drove me back inside. "...I hate it when you're right."

I grabbed a coat and ducked back outside before Doc could respond. I laughed a bit and looked around. Finally, it felt like Christmas instead of the Fourth of July, but with school in session. But there were only a few days of school left! I remembered when Doc homeschooled me, that if I worked extra hard two weeks before Christmas, I could have the week before Christmas off, too. Unfortunately, now I went to a regular school now because Doc was so busy. At least I had met some new friends (and some incredibly cute boys).

I walked into Flo's blissfully warm cafe, which was already pretty busy for a Sunday morning, thanks to Fillmore and Sarge. I got in the line as I rubbed my hands together - I should have gotten some gloves, too. I wondered if it might snow, and I'd have my first white Christmas.

Flo finished with the person before me and smiled me as I stepped up to the counter. "Hey, there, honey. How ya doing?" Flo asked me cheerily.

"Cold, but good, thanks. You?"

"I'm good, thanks for asking! What can I getchya?"

"Um, can I have a glazed donut, please?"

"Sure," Flo said and she went to the kitchen to get my donut. I looked around the cafe and spotted Andrea and Shannon sitting at a booth together. I waved at them, trying to catch their eyes. Andrea just barely saw me and looked up from her pancakes. She waved back, grinning. She was wearing a fuchsia long-sleeved blouse with a crew neck and dark blue jeans, and a black headband held her short blonde bob back from her friendly chocolate-brown eyes. Shannon was wearing a gray hoodie with a black hockey stick on the front and black jeans. Her hair, parted over her left eye, was pulled up into a ponytail so that it would stop falling in her right eye. They both grinned at me and gestured for me to join them. I lifted a finger up to tell them I'd be right there as Flo returned with my donut in a bag.

"Thank you," I said politely as I paid for the tasty breakfast. I smiled at the dark-skinned woman before I turned around and headed for Shannon and Andrea.

"Hey, guys, what's up?" I asked as I slipped into the space next to Andrea.

"Not much, you?" Shannon replied.

"Putting up Christmas decorations today," Andrea said as she munched on her pancakes. Shannon gagged on her waffle.

"What? It's Christmas?!"

"Not yet, genius," I snorted. "Eleven days."

"Oh, dang, I thought it was the seventh..."

I raised my eyebrows at her. "Now I know what I'm going to get you for Christmas. A calendar."

Shannon groaned. "Dude, my grandma always gets me that. You're turning into my grandma!"

Andrea and I laughed as I dug my donut out of it's bag. Mm, it was still warm. I bit into the sugary goodness and almost closed my eyes in bliss. "Gaaah, so good," I moaned happily.

"Now you sound like a drunk person," Shannon remarked. Andrea snorted, which was a bad thing since she was taking a sip of water. I think you all know what happens when you snort while drinking - you get a big mess. She ended up getting water up her nose, on the table, and on her face. Shannon and I died laughing as Lightning walked up, snickering.

"Nice, Andrea. Very mature," he said teasingly. Andrea blushed as she mopped herself up.

"I could say the same to you," she retorted as she wiped her nose on the napkin. Lightning smiled at us.

"So, how are you guys? What are you all doing today?" Lightning asked us.

"I dunno," Shannon shrugged.

"Putting up Christmas decorations," Andrea and I said unison. Lightning nodded as he stepped backwards to let a little old lady pass.

"Same here. I'm helping Sally put up some decorations at the Cozy Cones," Lightning informed us.

"Cool. If you need help, just call me," I offered. Andrea and Shannon agreed.

"Thanks, guys," Lightning said gratefully, smiling at us. "I better go. See ya."

"Bye."

"TTYL."

"Later."

I finished my donut. "I better go if I'm going to put up stuff round my place and help Lightning," I told my friends as I stood up, brushing crumbs off my hands.

"Do you want some help?" Shannon offered. I shrugged.

"Sure, that'd be great," I accepted.

"I can help for a bit," Andrea added. "My parents are still sleeping, somehow."

I glared at Fillmore and Sarge, who were wisely exiting the restaurant before one of us three teenagers could punish them for their sinful deeds. "Wow, a miracle," I said dryly. "But yeah, that'd be great. I can help you, too, later."

"Thanks," Andrea said, smiling as she finished her pancakes, which were slightly soggy because of the water she had spilled on them. The two of us stared at Shannon as she shoveled down her waffle.

"What? Stop staring at me," she growled. We snickered and just kept watching her, and she groaned, rolling her eyes. She ate the last bite and then wiped her mouth before jumping up, then nearly falling down because of the small space and the seat knocking against the back of her knees. Andrea and I slid gracefully out of the booth and waved to Flo as we walked outside.

The wind was blowing again, and I stuck my hands in my pocket to stay warm. "Come on, let's go," I said unnecessarily to my friends. We sprinted to my house and rushed through the door. "Hi, Doc, I'm back."

"Okay," Doc called from another room.

"Come on, I think he's in the basement," I said as I was about to lead my two best friends into our basement, then I stopped. "Never mind, you don't wanna see our basement. It's a huge mess..."

Andrea laughed. "Okay," she said as she hung her coat up in the closet.

I loudly jogged down the stairs, clutching the hand rail. "Hey, Doc, Shannon and Andrea came over. They want to help. Is that okay?" I asked him as I spotted him digging some boxes full of Christmas decorations out of a large pile of more boxes.

"The more the merrier," he grunted as he finally got the box out of the pile without having the entire thing collapse. I rolled my eyes.

"We need to clean this place up soon," I muttered as I went to help him.

* * *

Long story short, Doc and I got all the decorations out of the basement with only a few avalanches. Then, the fun began.

The house was already fairly clean because it was only Doc and I living in it, so we didn't have to waste a bunch of time cleaning. I used my iPod to play some Christmas music, starting with my favorite song, "Carol of the Bells". I love "Carol of the Bells" and other songs like it, like "Ring Christmas Bells" by Ray Conniff Singers. This version was sang by Emmy Rossum.

"Awww, this is so cute," Andrea squealed as she unwrapped a large snowglobe with Santa on his sleigh, pulled by his eight reindeer, inside of it. She shook it gently so that the snow fell down around the jolly old man and his reindeer.

"Yeah, we got that when I was... How old was I, Doc?"

"Eight," he grunted as he continued to struggle with untangling the lights.

"Yeah, thanks. So yeah, we got that when I was eight," I explained, smiling. We had gotten it when we went to Cracker Barrel for breakfast on Christmas Eve in 2009. We went to a largish city, and I could tell Doc was a bit nervous about being around so many people. I hadn't understood that at the time, but I later learned it was because he didn't want anyone to recognize the Fabulous Hudson Hornet. We ate breakfast (can't remember exactly what I ate, but it had lots and lots of syrup!) and were about to leave when I saw the snow globe. Being the eight year old I was, I thought it was adorable and wanted it so bad, but knew better than to ask.

Doc noticed my staring, and cleared his throat. "Kelly, why don't you go grab that snowglobe? I think Flo would love that in her store window."

Being the naive eight year old I was, I totally believed that it was for Flo. I held it the way home, looking at it glowingly. Once we got home, Doc took it into his room to 'wrap it up for Flo'. Instead, I found it under the Christmas tree the next morning, much to my excitement.

I smiled at the memory, and Doc had a slightly distant look in his eyes, so I think he was recalling that day, too. Andrea carefully put the snowglobe up on the center of the mantel and dove back to the other decorations.

* * *

About three hours later, we were done. The reason it took three hours was because Shannon (not me, **SHANNON**) 'accidentally' got us three girls tied up in tinsel. Doc spent half an hour untying us.

The house looked bright and cheery. In the living room, there was an artificial tree garland on the fireplace mantle, with a couple of snow-frosted pine cones, cranberries, and and the Santa Claus snowglobe nestled in it, two stockings hanging on the mantle, one for Doc, one for me, a nativity set on the coffee table by the wall in between two arm chairs, a stuffed Santa Claus standing in the corner by the door with a few fake presents, more tree garland on the window sills, with a few fake candles nestled in it, and some childish but cheery paper snowflakes on the windows. The left corner by the fireplace was empty, waiting for the Christmas tree.

In the kitchen, the fridge had some red ribbons on it to make it look like a giant present, a centerpiece of tree garland, holly, and frosted pine cones with two candles on either side of it on the table, which also had red place mats on top of the white table cloth, and a small, fake frosted Christmas tree on the counter. Also on the counter, there was a jar of candy canes and Hershey's Kisses, wrapped in Christmas colors, on it.

Two Nutcrackers guarded my room from the outside, keeping intruders from the decorated inside. My bedspread was red with big white snowflakes on it, and I had a round peppermint candy pillow on top of my normal white one. There was fake snow and snowmen on the window sills of my two windows on either side of my bed, and a three-foot tall fake Christmas tree in the corner of my room, across from my desk. It had a red tree skirt that matched my bedspread, and was decorated with red, green, and white balls. It also had a classic red and green paper chain on it.

In the hallway, there were a few small wreaths on the wall, and on the table in the middle of the wall between the front door and the entrance to the living room, there were two toy soldiers on either side of a bowl of ornaments, and three tall candles standing behind the bowl. Near the edge of the table was a white wooden cut out of the word "NOEL". In all, I think our house looked pretty great.

We girls then moved over to Andrea's, leaving Doc to peacefully enjoy the newly decorated house, and spent two uneventful hours there (thankfully no one tied us up in tinsel, mainly because Shannon had to go home) before continuing to the Cozy Cones.

"Hey, guys," I called out to Lightning and Sally, who were toting boxes out of Sally's office. Lightning raised a hand in greeting and nearly lost the box he was holding. "Smooth, Light."

Sally, who hadn't seen, sent a sharp glance towards Lightning. "What'd you do this time, Stickers?" she asked in bored, 'not again' tone.

"Nothing!" he protested as he set the box down. "See? The lights are all in one."

Sally gave him an amused look before looking back at us. "So how are you two doing?"

"Goooooood," I drawled out. "We just came over here to help you guys out with decorating."

Sally smiled gratefully. "Oh, thanks. I appreciate that. So Lightning and I can tackle hanging up the lights - I don't trust you two on ladders."

"HEY!"

Sally continued," If you two could get the yard stuff, that'd be helpful."

Although I was a little annoyed about Sally's 'not trusting us on ladders' thing, Andrea and I just nodded and headed for the tallest box labeled '_Yard Decorations_' as Shannon ran up.

"Hey, what'd I miss?" she panted as she slowed to a stop. I explained the plans and Shannon nodded in understanding. "Sounds good."

With that, Shannon tore open the box and pounced upon a pack of two and a half feet tall plastic candy canes. She untied the twine wrapped around them and grabbed a stick lying on the ground near Cone Number One, and starting poking holes in the ground to later insert the candy canes in around the half-circle of land in between Sally's house and Main Street (did that make sense?). I laughed a bit as I grabbed a box of ornaments and starting decorating the cactus outside Cone Number Three.

Lightning climbed up on top of the ladder to start string lights around the door of Cone Number One as Sally outlined the base of the motel with lights. I hoped no one would step on them. I moved on from the cactus after a good five or six needles had found my clumsy hands, which were shaking from cold (I had taken my gloves off for the delicate operation, but obviously, that was a mistake). I removed the needles from my hands, cursing, as I slipped away to Sally's lobby to grab some anointment. I quickly applied that then ran back outside to join in the decorating again.

"Hey, Sally?" Lightning called as I returned to the group and grabbed some three foot tall plastic snowman to arrange around Shannon's candy canes.

"Mm-hmm?"

"Could you pass me some more lights?"

Sally walked around from the back of the Cone and looked up at Lightning, who was sitting on the door canopy above the front door of the Cone. She frowned. "Um... Could you just come down here and get them?"

Lightning smirked and shook his head, pretending to be ignorant to reality - the jerk knew full-well that Sally was not found of heights. However, refusing the let Lightning get the best of her, Sally just gritted her teeth and grabbed some lights and wound them around her arm so she had both hands free for climbing. She gripped the ladder with a pale hand and took a deep breath.

"Sally? Do you want me to get it?" I called, concerned. She shook her head without looking at me, and started to climb, her knuckles white as paper. Lightning looked somewhat surprised at her determination, and even more shocked when she reached the top, whipped something (my guess is mistletoe) out from her back pocket, held it over their heads, and kissed him. Actually, he was so surprised, he slipped and fell off the canopy, thankfully landing in a bush. My mouth fell open in surprise and amusement, and I gave a small, almost disbelieving laugh.

Sally tossed the lights on top of the door canopy, climbed down a few rungs, and then jumped off the ladder, smirking as Lightning thrashed around in the bush.

"Thanks, Stickers. Now I'm not as afraid of heights," she said cheerfully as she started to skip to the back of the Cone to resume her decorating, stuffing the mistletoe back in her pocket to keep for her next victim. Lightning jumped out of the bush, brushing some dead leaves off his jacket.

"Hey! What kind of kiss do you call that?" he yelled as he raced towards Sally. Sally laughed and starting running around the Cone. They raced around and around it until Lightning finally got smart and started racing the other way around the Cone. Unsuspecting Sally nearly ran into him as he grabbed her and kissed her passionately. She was surprised, but pleased, and kissed him back. I rolled my eyes in amusement and started to turn back to my snowman, but instead found myself facing Aidan Spencer. I yelped in surprise, and he grinned, then pointed at Lightning and Sally.

"Is that us in five years?" he inquired. I facepalmed and shoved him away. Aidan had a massive crush on me, and was practically my own personal stalker. He was annoying, but I had to admit, it felt good to know that someone actually felt _that_ way about me. "Okay, six?"

I glared at him. He grinned goofily and just shrugged. Shannon had once insisted that we were perfect for each other - we were both kind of silly, both had blue eyes, although Aidan's were lighter, and were both obsessed with chocolate. My response had been to sock her in the arm. "Aidan, you dork. Why do you always have to sneak up on me?!"

"I read that when you catch people off-guard, they tend to 'fess up easier," he said logically. We were both also very educated in both regular school and the art of the comeback.

"I once read that when you break someone's nose, they go away," I retorted in a sweet, cheery tone.

"Aw, come on, Kelly, we all know how much you love my nose," he said, acting flirty. I gave another brief laugh. I hated to admit it, but Aidan Spencer always succeeded in making me laugh.

"Go away, Aidan."

"What's the magic word?"

"What are you, four?"

"Mm, maybe."

"Ugh... PLEASE get out of here before I rearrange your face."

"You're very cheerful today, aren't you?"

"Aidan, please, I'm busy!" I huffed. He held his gloved hands up in surrender.

"Okay, okay... See ya, baby," he said, then ran off.

"I AM NOT YOUR BABY!" I hollered after him. Oh, he was so lucky there was no snow on the ground. Otherwise, he'd be dealing with a snowball down his shirt. I whipped around and squealed in surprise as someone scooped me up, bridal-style

"Haha, now you're my baby!" Lightning crowed delightedly. "Hey, Sally, look, we have a baby!"

Sally looked up from her lights in slight alarm. "WHA - oh. Aw, she's cute," Sally teased after her initial shock. I crossed my arms and glared at Lightning.

"Seriously? Put me down," I demanded heatedly. Lightning just laughed.

"Aw, you're a feisty little baby, aren't you?" Lightning said as he started cooing over me like I was a real baby and starting swinging me around so I was forced to wrap my arms around his neck so I wouldn't going flying to the cold, hard ground.

"Lightning!" I laughed, my annoyance fading slightly, replaced by amusement. "Come on, put me down! Please? We have work to do!"

Lightning swung me onto my feet, and I stumbled a bit, but he helped to steady me. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," I said laughingly, dusting myself off before returning to my snowmen, still smiling slightly in amusement.

* * *

We finished decorating the Cozy Cones without further interruptions, and by then, it was about three, which meant we were all starving. Despite my stomach's growling, I was happy. The Cozy Cones looked awesome. Candy canes dotted the border of the land between the road and Sally's office (we had moved my snowmen to stand outside a couple of the Cozy Cones' doors alongside a couple of Nutcrackers and Santa Clauses of relatively the same height because there weren't enough snowmen to make a good pattern among the candy canes), lights lined the doors and bases of the cones and several cacti (my genius idea), and those white wire reindeer with the lights on them stood were scattered around the Cozy Cones. Lights also lined the motel lobby and Sally's home, and two plastic, three-foot-tall toy soldiers guarded her doors.

"Wow, thanks guys. The place looks amazing," Sally said happily as she surveyed the area.

"No problem," I said, smiling at the young woman. She brushed a bit of her curly blonde hair out of her green eyes and smiled back.

"All right, who wants lunch at Flo's? My treat," she announced. I grinned again as my stomach grumbled loudly in a "HECK, YA." Everyone laughed as we started off towards Flo's cafe, Lightning, the pig, happily leading the way.

I won't go into detail about the rest of the relatively ordinary day, except I will say that Lightning did scarf down three sandwiches at Flo's.

_Boys._

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Hey guys! Hope you liked this chapter! Sorry if it was too long for some of your likings, but I want to do twelve chapters covering each day from the fourteenth to the twenty-fifth of December - the twelve days of Christmas. ;)

Reviews make me smile... And I'd just like to say that forty comments on this entire book (which will be twelve chapters, just in case you didn't pick up on the cheesey twelve days of Christmas thingy) would be the best Christmas present ever... *wink wink nudge nudge*

Thanks for reading!

Kitty

P.S. Just wanna say that I had a dance show last night, and I don't mean to brag, but I did AWESOME. I'm really happy about that, cause I was put in a bad group, so I'm grateful that I could at least do well in that stupid group. Okay, I'll shut up now.


	2. Chapter 2: Day Two

**Monday, December 15, 2014 - Ten Days until Christmas**

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The next morning, I woke up at six o'clock to Fillmore and Sarge yelling again. I snorted sleepily, then groaned. I didn't wanna get up, I didn't wanna get up...

"Kelly! Time to get up for school!"

I grabbed my pillow from underneath my head and smacked my in the face with it, stifling another groan. Why couldn't I live in a world where school started at ten thirty or something instead of seven fifteen...

"Kelly!"

"I'M UP!" I yelled, taking my pillow off my face. I rolled myself out of bed and practically crawled into my bathroom to prepare myself to face reality.

If this was reality, I really hated it.

Then I remembered yesterday, and how much fun I had had decorating my house, Andrea's house, and the Cozy Cones with my friends. I smiled a bit as I remembered how Sally had gotten her revenge on Lightning for making her climb the ladder and how he had fallen in the bush, then chased her around the Cone like a kindergartner. I remembered getting tied up in tinsel with my two best friends, and eating lunch at Flo's with Sally, Lightning, Shannon, and Andrea. I guess reality wasn't really all that bad... Then Doc called for me, announcing I had thirty minutes before we had to go, and I changed my mind again as I started the shower. _Some_ reality was bad, but some was good, too... I had to stop with this philosopher crap, I needed to go!

Thirty minutes later, Doc and I were in his old Hudson Hornet, driving out of Radiator Springs to my school, which was in a nearby town called Jackson about fifteen miles away, a twenty-five minute drive. "All right, so I talked to some people at Flo's last night, and we all agreed to met up today after school at that tree farm in Jackson and cut down some of our own trees this year," Doc said, breaking the sleepy silence.

"Oh, really? Fun. Who's coming?" I asked, stifling a yawn.

"I believe it's going to be Lightning, Sally, Mater, Flo, Ramone, Andrea's and Shannon's families, Luigi and Guido, and us," Doc said. I sighed in relief.

"So Lizzie isn't coming this year?"

"Nope."

Thank goodness. A couple of years ago, before Lightning came to the town, several of Radiator Spring's residents had went to chop down some trees, and Lizzie had gotten lost. We had spent about an hour searching for her, and were about to call the police, but then we had found her sleeping in Doc's car, which had been supposed to have been locked. Doc later commented on our drive home that he had been surprised that it had been Lizzie who had gotten lost, and not me. I had only been seven at the time, but I had known a sarcastic insult when I heard one. I refused to talk to my chuckling guardian for the rest of the ride home.

I snorted as remembered that memorable trip outside of Radiator Springs. "What's so funny?" Doc asked as we entered Jackson. I told him as I looked outside the window. Jackson was a typical town. It was larger and younger than Radiator Springs, but it still had that old, small town feeling. All the stores were decorated with wreaths and lights, and people walking down the streets, clutching cups of coffee from Starbucks, often waved to each other. It was a cute place, but I preferred Radiator Springs.

Doc pulled to a stop outside the high school. "Have a good day, Kelly. Andrea's mom will be driving you to the tree farm because I have to give someone a check-up at two-thirty."

I nodded. "Okay, thanks. Bye, Doc."

"Bye," Doc bid me good-bye in his usual gruff voice, and I smiled at him as I stepped out of the car. I swung my back-pack over my shoulder as I heard someone call my name. I looked up as two girls both with dark-brown hair came walking up to me. Jenny Webber and Grace Young.

"Hey, guys," I said. Jenny and Grace were friends of mine, but we weren't super close. "How's it going?"

"Pretty good, you?" Grace replied as we started walking towards the school.

"I'm good, thanks. Spent most of yesterday decorating, which was fun. Can you believe how cold it is?" I asked, glancing around. "I hope it snows. It'd be my first white Christmas."

Jenny's eyes widened. She was from Colorado, where it apparently snowed a lot. "You haven't had a white Christmas before? That stinks. Christmas is a lot more fun with snow. It's prettier, and whenever your brother gets you stupid presents, you can go outside, grab some snow, and stuff it down his shirt," she said casually. My eyebrows raised.

"Are you claiming to have done that?"

Jenny smirked. "Maybe I am, maybe I'm not."

"She hasn't," Grace revealed. Jenny glared at her, and Grace stared right back. "Jen, you don't HAVE a brother."

I laughed as Jenny facepalmed. "You didn't have to tell her that. Saying I did it to my brother makes a better joke than saying I did it to my older sister," Jenny muttered moodily.

Grace laughed as I assured that no matter who she did it to, it was still a funny joke. We entered the building, and Shannon joined us.

"Hey, guys," she greeted us as she walked up to me and we linked arms. I gestured to Grace, who linked her arms in Jenny's and mine. We laughed for no good reason because that's what silly teenage girls like us do.

We turned a corner and saw Andrea closing her locker. Without hesitation, Shannon grabbed the blonde's arm and swung her around so that she was in line with us. Andrea accidentally bumped into another boy, and she squealed,"Sorry!" She looked at Shannon. "What are you doing?"

"I don't know, ask Kelly," Shannon suggested. Andrea looked at me expectantly.

"Ask Grace."

"Ask Jenny."

"Ask Fred."

"Who's Fred?"

"I dunno."

We burst out giggling like some stupid clique at Jenny's joke as we passed my locker, and I detached myself from the others. "See ya later." They chirped their good-byes and walked off. I smiled as I unlocked my locker. It felt good to have some girlfriends to goof off with. Before Lightning had come to Radiator Springs, I hadn't had anyone to do that stuff with. The youngest woman in our town had been Sally, who was almost twenty-five when she arrived in Radiator Springs, about five months before Lightning. Sally was nice, but just not the same as, you know, a friend _my_ age.

I grabbed my books and whipped around, nearly colliding with a certain stalker named Aidan. "Aidan!" I shrieked in surprise. "Seriously, stop _doing_ that to me!"

"I can't help it," Aidan said, shrugging carelessly with a flirty grin on his face. I remembered Holley Shiftwell, the spy I had meet over the summer (long story short, Mater and I helped her and her partner Finn McMissile on a mission, and Holley was currently Mater's girlfriend) and wondered if she would loan me her electro-shock taser temporarily. Maybe Aidan would be able to help himself if I gave him a nice little shock...

"Well, you better, cause I need to get to class," I hissed as the bell went off. I ducked under the doofus's arm and strode down the hall towards my Algebra classroom. When I was about ten feet away, the door started closing, and I broke into a jog. I slipped under Ms. Andrew's arm as she shut the door. "Miss Hudson!" she exclaimed.

"Sorry," I said, blushing a bit as I grinned apologetically at her. I might have gotten in trouble if it weren't for the fact that I'm one of the best students in her class (couldn't say the same about Social Studies - or nap time is what I personally call that class). Ms. Andrews shook her head and pointed to my desk. Among snickers, I slunk over to it and noisily dumped my books on it. More snickers arose as I slumped into my chair. Ms. Andrews rolled her eyes and stepped back towards the blackboard.

"Good morning, class. This week, we will be learning about linear functions..."

* * *

Seven boring hours later, Shannon, Andrea, and I walked out of school. "Only four days left until we get our FREEDOM!" I yelled, punching the air in triumph.

"Only for about two weeks," Andrea reminded me. I glared.

"Oh, just let me have some triumph over this stinking school," I complained. Andrea smirked as her mother pulled up, and we walked over to the white Kia Soul and hopped in.

"Hey, Mom," Andrea greeted as she buckled up.

"Hello, Mrs. Hussarya," Shannon and I greeted Andrea's mom. She looked back at us with her warm brown eyes that matched Andrea's perfectly.

"Hi, girls. How was school?" she greeted us with a smile.

"Eh, school-ey," I responded. She laughed and turned back to face the front as she drove away from the school.

"Are you girls all ready to go tree-hunting?" Mrs. Hussarya asked.

"Yup!"

"Yeah!"

"Yeah, totally."

We all talked about our Christmas plans on the way to the tree farm. We were all going to be in Radiator Springs on Christmas Day, but the Hussaryas would be gone on the twentieth and twenty-first at Mr. Hussarya's parents, who lived about two hours away in Kirkland, Arizona.

"Would you two want to go Christmas shopping with me on Thursday after school, if it's okay with your parents?" Andrea asked, looking back at us from the passenger seat.

"Yeah, sure, I'd love to," I said, and Shannon agreed. Andrea grinned.

"Cool. Wanna go to the mall in Clinton? If that's okay with you, Mom," Andrea suggested, looking at her mother. Mrs. Hussarya nodded. Clinton was a city about forty minutes away from Radiator Springs. A fairly big distance, but it had a nice mall. Jackson and Radiator Springs didn't have any malls, but I had heard that Jackson was thinking of making one. That'd be nice. I wouldn't have to drive forty minutes just to get to Macy's. Or really, Doc would be the one doing the driving. "You guys aren't going to the winter dance on Friday, right?"

I nodded, jerking myself out of my thoughts about the mall. My school was having a small winter dance on Friday, but I wouldn't be going. I didn't really go to any dances except for the big ones, like homecoming. That had been fun. I had worn a red, ruffled dress with a black, silver, and red beaded belt at the empire waist. There had been three layers of ruffles, and the dress had ended just above my knees. It had also been incredibly fun to twirl around in, until I fell over the chair at my desk and nearly ripped the fabric.

"I'm going, actually. Hunter just asked me this morning!" Shannon said happily. My mouth dropped open.

"Oh my gosh, that's awesome!" Andrea squealed, grinning broadly at our friend. I could only gap. WHY DIDN'T SHE TELL ME EARLIER?

I grabbed Shannon's shoulders and shook her. "WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME EARLIER?" I half shouted, half squealed. "That is so, so, so awesome! Congrats!"

Shannon grinned a bit sheepishly. "Sorry, I was just so shocked. I mean, what boy would every like ugly old me?"

"You aren't ugly! You're gorgeous! Come on, you honestly can't call yourself ugly! You're the skinniest girl at our school, have barely any pimples, and your hair is awesome! You're one of the prettiest girls I've ever seen!" I nearly shouted, annoyed. Shannon always claimed that she wasn't pretty, which was one of the stupidest things I've ever heard. No matter what she says, trust me - her black hair is sleek and shiny, her brown eyes are clear and bright, she's tall and skinny, and if it weren't for the fact that she does track, therefore sweating a bunch, she'd be completely pimple free. Okay, now this is getting to be a somewhat strange conversation, but I just want to prove my point - I'M RIGHT ABOUT THE FACT THAT SHANNON IS NOT UGLY. I'm right about _everything_! Almost.

"Yeah, sure," Shannon said, rolling her eyes, but she was too excited to protest. Hunter Shawn was this kid in our grade that she had been crushing on for about a month now. He had blonde hair that was a little spikey in the front, like he had gotten a handful of hair gel and just ran it through the hair above his forehead, but otherwise pretty flat and controllable. He has light blue eyes, and I would call them 'icey', but they're actually very warm and friendly, if you know what I mean. He's about five foot five, my height, but growing rapidly in that way that only teenage boys can be. Hunter'll probably be five foot eight by the dance.

We talked about what Shannon was going to wear, and decided we'd have to go dress shopping on Thursday, when we went to the mall. Shannon wasn't too thrilled about that - she's a tomboy, but we finally convinced her to wear a dress. Andrea and I shared a glance that said," We'll get her in high heels, too, but better not tell her that yet." If we forced her to wear some right before she left, the element of surprise would shorten the length of the fight between us three girls.

"Uh, could one of you come with me? I'm kind nervous, you know? It's my first dance with a boy," Shannon said, glancing out the window, slightly embarrassed.

"Yeah, sure," I agreed instantly. That way I could give Hunter 'The Shovel Talk'. The Shovel Talk, in case you don't know, is when a girl makes it clear to her friend's boyfriend that if he ever hurts their friend, they'll hunt him down and beat him up with a shovel. I'll also casually mention that I know a guy who's in a huge spy agency, and he'll be more than willing to help me blow Hunter to pieces.

We arrived at the tree farm a few minutes later. Mrs. Hussarya parked on the side of the road - the farm didn't have a parking lot, just a bunch of trees ad a small dirt lane that served as the farm's driveway. We all hopped out and looked around for the rest of Radiator Springs's residents. "Over here!" I heard Flo call. I looked around and spotted the ex-showgirl waving at us from the stand at the top of the dirt lane. I ran up the road as I was reminded of the dirt track at Willy's Butte, or Willy's Butt, as I like to call it.

"Hey, guys!" I greeted Flo, Ramone, Mater, Guido, Luigi, Lightning, Sally, and Mr. and Mrs. Harper. More warm and excited greetings were shared. Andrea's five-year-old brothers Grant and Sam was looking around in fascination and excitement. Grant had Andrea's blonde hair, but blue-green eyes. He was a fairly mischievous kid, but nice enough. Andrea claims that he's a complete devil, but as far as little brothers go, he's pretty good. Sam looks exactly like Grant, but his nice side doesn't show nearly as much as his twin's.

I heard another engine from behind us, and I turned as Doc's Hudson Hornet pulled up. I waved as my adoptive father shut off the engine and stepped outside the car. He gave me a gruff smile back as he started up the lane. I wondered if he too was reminded of Willy's Butt. Butte. You know what I'm talking about.

"Hi, Doc," I said as he came into hearing range.

"Hey everyone. Hi, Kelly. How was school?"

Why does everyone always ask about school? No one wants to talk about school, unless they got a boyfriend or girlfriend, or won something, or got an A+, which I hadn't today. "Good enough. How did the check-up go?" I replied.

"Kid didn't bite me this time, so it went well," Doc said in his usual gravelly voice. I snorted, remembering the multiple kids who had bitten him. You wouldn't believe how many there were, but Doc doesn't like to talk about it.

Lightning laughed, not realizing that he was serious about being bitten. "Is everyone ready?" he asked. Everyone nodded. "All right. Sally talked to the manager, and he told her that the price is set by height. Twenty dollars for three foot trees, and then five dollars for each foot after. You know, twenty-five dollars for four footers, thirty for five footers, ect."

We all nodded. "Ok, everyone who wants one, get a saw, and let's go."

I started to follow Ramone to get a saw, but Doc held me back. "I think I'll take care of that," he said, amusement in his eyes. I tried to pout, but I couldn't. I was in too good of a mood to be upset. Doc went to get a saw, and we set off through the rows of green pine trees. I breathed in the piney, Christmas-y air and rubbed my hands together, then put them in the pocket of my purple coat. It was still cold, and I wished I had brought my black mittens.

"So we're going to get, what, a thirteen footer? Or should we get real fancy and get a fourteen foot tall tree?" I asked eagerly, half-skipping through the trees.

"Kelly, we have a nine foot ceiling in the living room," Doc chuckled as he followed me.

"So?" Shannon said as she walked up with her parents. Doc and Mr. and Mrs. Harper exchanged greetings, and I linked arms with Shannon like I had earlier at school. Of course, we almost ran into a really tall, really fat tree then. "Oh! Mom, Dad, it's perfect!"

Mr. Harper laughed. "Sweetheart, that's taller than our house."

It was true. The Harpers' house was only one floor, and this tree was about thirty feet high. "You could make it work," I said, squinting at it as if I were trying to come up with an idea to get it to fit into Shannon's house.

"If we sawed off about half of it, I think we'd be able to squeeze it inside," Shannon tried to convince her dad.

Mr. Harper laughed again and ruffled Shannon's hair affectionately. "Nice try, you two," he said good-naturally. We grinned at each other, amusement sparkling in our eyes.

We moved on, and didn't really find anything except for Lightning and Sally. "Oh, hey, guys," Lightning greeted, waving at us with his saw-free hand. I noticed the green pine needles sprinkled in his messy, dark red hair, and wondered how that had happened. I asked, and he just shrugged and said," Long story."

Sally snorted, tossing her curly blonde hair out of her face just to have the wind blow it back into her green eyes. "You just don't want to tell it," she said teasingly.

"Do you want to share it?" Lightning asked slyly. She instantly shook her head 'no', and I laughed.

"How tall of a tree are you guys looking for?" I asked as we all set off together.

"Sally wants a five foot tree for the Cozy Cones's lobby, and I want a seven footer for my place," Lightning said, glancing around for the perfect trees. I nodded.

"Okay, cool. I'm guessing you haven't found the right ones yet?"

"Naw. I saw one that I thought would look great in the lobby, but Sally didn't agree."

"Stickers, it was the very definition of a Charlie Brown tree. It just wasn't right," Sally said defensively. My eyes widened in excitement at the mention of a Charlie Brown tree.

"Oh, where?" I asked. Sally smiled at me.

"I can show you. It _was_ kinda funny, how much it looked like the tree from Charlie Brown, but not right for the lobby," Sally explained.

"Okay," I said as she turned around. "Be right back, Doc."

"Okay."

Shannon followed, saying that she wanted to see the Charlie Brown tree, too. "I wonder if my parents will let me buy it to put in my room," she wondered eagerly. Sally and I giggled.

"It was a cute little tree."

I looked around, trying to spot it. I didn't find the Charlie Brown tree, but I did spot a tall, thin evergreen that I instantly loved. It was perfect height at maybe eight feet, and had more of a blue color than the other dark green trees. "Oh my gosh, that's the perfect tree for Doc and me!" I exclaimed, pointing at it. Sally and Shannon's gazed at it.

"I like it," Sally said, smiling and nodding in approval. "Is it too tall, though?"

I frowned. Trees always seemed shorter outside than in. Doc and I had learned that when we had bought a tree two years ago that looked like it was just eight feet, but turned out to be ten. We had to cut some of the poor thing's bottom off. Pfft... Bottom. Heh. Okay, I'll stop being weird and obnoxious now. "I dunno, guess we'll just find out. I'm going to go find Doc and show him, but you guys keep on going."

Sally and Shannon nodded, and I turned on my heel and jogged to where we had just come from. "Doc!" I called.

"Kelly?"

"Hey Doc, I - ACK!" I nearly ran into Mrs. Harper. I cringed. "Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry, Mrs. Harper!"

"It's fine," Mrs. Harper assured me. I nodded, biting my lip in discomfort, then turned to Doc.

"I found the perfect tree up there," I said, pointing in the direction of the tree. Doc nodded.

"All right, let's go take a look."

We walked off in the direction of my tree, weaving around other trees that no longer looked as pleasing, compared to my tree. After a minute of silently walking, excitement bubbling up inside of me, we reached the tree. "Here it is! Don't you love it?"

Doc nodded, frowning as he inspected it. "It's a good size, but I dunno about the color. Maybe we should keep looking."

My grin fell a bit, but I forced myself to recover. A Christmas tree wasn't anything to pout over. "Okay."

"Hey, Kelly!"

"Be right back," I told Doc, then jogged away through the trees.

I jogged around a few trees before Shannon and Sally came into my view. They were laughing affectionately over a small tree in between them, and I gave a laugh, too. It was the very definition of a Charlie Brown tree. It was short with few branches, and it barely had any needles. I wondered if the pine needles in Lightning's hair had anything to do with that. "Oh my gosh, that's amazing," I laughed, brushing some of my curly light brown hair back behind my ear.

"I know, right? Perfect Charlie Brown tree," Shannon said, crouching down and stroking one of it's barest branches with her thumb.

"We should name it," Sally suggested, giggling slightly. I nodded.

"Edward?" I suggested. Shannon shook her head.

"No, that's the creepy sparkling fairy dude from Twilight's name," she said, frowning. Neither of us liked Twilight. "How about Fred?"

"I dated a guy named Fred when I was your age. This tree is NOT a Fred, trust me," Sally said, wrinkling her nose, as she remembered this _Fred_. "William?"

"Too big of a name. Bob?" I suggested. We all looked at each other.

"Nah," we said in unison.

"How bout Chuck?" Shannon suggested. Sally and I looked at each other and shrugged.

"Works for me," I said.

"Chuck it is," Sally agreed. We all looked at Chuck in silence for a minute.

"I can't believe we just named him, and we won't even be able to keep him," I said sadly. "Poor Chuck. I hope he finds a good family."

"He will. I'll take him," Shannon volunteered, standing up.

"Will your parents let you?" I asked, still looking at Chuck. Shannon reached down and plucked him out of the ground, his dirty, tangled roots hanging down. Sally's and my mouths fell open.

"What did you do that for?" Sally asked, shocked as she stared in slight horror at Chuck.

"My parents can't deny me if I already have him," Shannon shrugged.

"Is he even up for sale? Was that even LEGAL?" I pointed out. Shannon frowned, now looking a bit worried, then shrugged it off.

"Guess we'll find out," she said, shrugging. I looked up, slightly panicked, when I heard footsteps crunching closer on the frozen ground, but it wasn't the manager, it was just Andrea and her family.

"Hey, g - _What_ are you doing?" Andrea stared at Chuck in surprise and confusion.

"We named a tree, and now I'm going to buy him."

"What'd you name it?"

"Chuck!"

"_Chuck?_"

"Yeah. You gotta problem with that?"

"No. He just doesn't look like a Chuck to me..." Andrea cocked her head to the side, as if he's look like a Chuck from that angle. Sally and I looked at each other and snickered as Doc also approached. I threw my hands up in surrender.

"That wasn't my idea," I said immediately, talking about Chuck, whom Doc hadn't yet seen. Doc looked confused and suspicious.

"What'd you do?"

"Nothing!" I said quickly, glancing at Chuck. Sally facepalmed, the sound muffled by her white mittens. Doc's gaze turned to Chuck, who was dangling in Shannon's hand, who was grinning guiltily. He raised an eyebrow but didn't comment.

"Come on, I think I found a good tree," Doc said, turning around to lead me to the tree. I followed him, still looking at Chuck.

"If anyone asks, I wasn't here, okay?" I told Shannon, who snorted.

"Sure."

Doc and I walked through the labyrinth of Christmas trees until we came to a stop at what I supposed was the tree Doc had found. "What do you think?"

I looked at it. It was tall and bushier than the tree I had found, and it was the classic rich green color. A grin spread onto my face. "Wow, it's great. I love it," I told Doc honestly. He grinned at me.

"Alright, want to help me chop it down?"

"Sure. I'll saw it and you'll hold it upright," I said, reaching for the saw jokingly.

"I think I'll take care of the sawing part," he chuckled, getting down on his knees to start sawing. I groaned comically but didn't complain as I reached into the tree, grasping for the trunk, but yelped a several pine needles impaled themselves into my skin.

"You okay?" Doc asked, looking out from under the tree.

"Yeah, I just got some pine needles in my hand," I explained, pulling them out and throwing them away. "They don't hurt as much as cacti needles, though."

"Here," Doc said, passing me his thick gloves. I shook my head and gently pushed them back.

"You can keep them, I'll be fine," I insisted. "Besides, you're the one with the big, sharp saw."

Doc nodded and put his gloves back on as I tried to grab the tree's trunk again, more carefully this time. I still got a couple of needles in my hands, but I didn't complain.

The usual sawing sound filled the air, and the tree shook a bit as Doc sawed through it. "Okay, almost done," he said, and the I tightened my grip around the tree as the saw finished it's job.

"Ack!"

"Do you got it?"

"Yeah, just get out of there now."

Doc shimmied out of under the tree. "You can gently lower it down now - " Doc started, and I released the tree, which crashed to the ground. "Or just let it fall."

* * *

About an hour later, everyone met up at the tree farm's 'desk' to cough up their money. Mater had a pretty tall tree, that I supposed was about ten feet tall, but the tallest tree was Andrea's. Her lucky family had a two story house, and their living room was two stories with a ceiling of about eighteen feet. The Hussaryas took advantage of the opportunity and always got huge Christmas trees. This year's tree was thirteen feet, and Andrea insisted it was short. Compared to their fifteen-footer from last year, it was. However, Chuck (who's roots Shannon had cut off, and was bought for ten dollars) looked especially tiny and sad next to the Hussaryas' tree.

Doc and I hoisted the tree onto his old Hudson Hornet, and it looked pretty funny. You don't see too many old race cars cruising down the road with a tree strapped onto the top of it. Even funnier was Lightning's stock car, hauling his eight and a half foot tree home. And then Sally's Porsche... Before we left I caught the tree farm manager laughing at us. But I couldn't blame him. I was laughing pretty hard myself.

* * *

WOAH, long chapter. Hope y'all liked it.

Funny story: MY CHRISTMAS TREE BITES. My family was trying to decorate it last night, and we needed gloves to keep the needles from digging into our skin. I swear I heard it laugh evilly once, too. O.o

Thanks for reading! Please review, and thanks to my reviewers from the last chapter! Your comments all made me smile. :)

Kitty


	3. Chapter 3: Day Three

**Tuesday, December 16, 2014 - Nine Days Until Christmas**

...

* * *

**Shannon's P.O.V.**

I woke up to the usual - Sarge's and Fillmore's daily music fight. I groaned as I rolled over onto my stomach. I'd have to do something about that soon...

I forced myself out of bed and into the bathroom, yawning and dragging my feet. By the time I had finished combing my hair, I had thankfully woken up, and was ready to face the world.

I won't bug you with the boring details of my rushed breakfast and trip to school. I'll just tell you about what happened at my locker.

I opened my locker as I heard someone say, "Hey, Shannon."

I smiled at the familiar voice. "Hey, Hunter. What's up?"

"The sky," Hunter replied matter-of-factly. I grinned as I pulled my history book out from the depths of my blue, metal locker, which, by the way, was FREEZING cold. "Not much, actually. You?"

"Just wishing that it would snow a bunch tonight and we'd get a snow day tomorrow," I sighed, slamming my locker shut and looking at my date, smiling as I brushed my black hair out of my right eye again.

"That'd be awesome, huh?" Hunter agreed as we started walking towards my Social Studies classroom. We both looked wistfully out the window at the bare, dead ground.

"Totally. I used to live in Iowa, and it snowed there quite a bit." I smiled, remembering cold, blustery recesses spent by the girls waging snowball war against the boys.

"Lucky. I've lived here all my life, and the most snow I've ever seen was three inches. It was enough to get a snow day, though."

I stared at him in surprise. "Seriously? You got a snow day with three _inches_ of snow? Pfft, that's nothing. It took about three feet to get a snow day at my old place."

Hunter shrugged. "Three inches is three inches more snow than Arizona normally gets. Considering a cold day here is about sixty degrees, I'd say that three inches of snow is a lot."

"That's barely enough to make a snowman! Heck with a snowman, three inches is barely enough to make a snow_ball!_" I scoffed as we entered my Social Studies room.

"I've never seen a real snowman," Hunter mused.

"Then you've never lived," I reasoned. Hunter laughed. "Making snowmen is fun. Making an army of snowmen that blocks the school parking lot is really, really fun."

"You did that?" Hunter asked, amused.

"No... Not alone, anyway. My friends and I all did."

Hunter laughed. "Did you get in trouble?"

"If you consider a week of detention trouble, yeah, we did."

The bell rang, and Hunter looked around, as if realizing he were at school. "Oh, dang, I have to go. My Algebra class is about to start."

I remembered his classroom was on the other side of the school. "Oh my gosh, sorry, I totally forgot that your classroom is so far away."

"It's fine, it was my choice to come here with you," Hunter said as he started backing away.

"Here, I'll come with you," I offered, slipping out the door with him.

"What? No, you'll be late," Hunter said, frowning.

I just walked away in the direction of his Algebra classroom, weaving around the other students who were rushing to their own classes and calling over my shoulder," Now we'll be late together."

Hunter jogged up to me. "There's no reason for both of us to be late."

"Eh, I never liked Social Studies anyways. I don't see why it's called that. There's no socializing going on, just boring history and the occasional spitball fight," I said.

"Do you ever take part in that?"

"If I've got a straw handy, maybe."

Hunter laughed as we turned into the corridor his Algebra class was in. It was kind of peaceful now. Everyone was in their classrooms, and it was silent except for our footsteps and voices. "I knew I liked you."

I blushed. "Thanks, I like you too."

"See ya, and thanks," Hunter said as he reached his Algebra classroom.

"Anytime," I said as I turned around and started to job back to my Social Studies, my head spinning like I had just stepped off an insane roller coaster ride. Hunter said he liked me, Hunter said he liked me, a boy actually said HE LIKED ME!

I was so high on Cloud Nine I almost passed my classroom, but I realized where I was just in time. I stopped and reentered the room. The door creaked open noisily, and I winced. I had known I wouldn't make it back in without being noticed, but hey, anyone can dream, right? My teacher stopped his boring lecture and turned away from the blackboard. "Miss Harper, you are late."

Thank you, Captain Obvious.

"Sorry," I murmured.

"Detention with me after school," he said dully before turning back to the blackboard. I stuck my tongue out at him as I sat down at my desk. Thankfully, he didn't see that. Score. Now if only I had a straw...

Something hit me in the back of my head, and I hissed," Ouch!"

I looked behind me to see a slightly crumbled paper airplane on the floor. I glanced up and saw Kelly mouthing, " Sorry!" at me from her desk across the aisle. I shrugged and picked up the note. I opened it under my desk and and read,"_Where were you?_"

I quietly scribbled my answer - "_Hunter walked me to class and was going to be late, so I returned the favor and walked him back to his class._" I folded the paper and wrote Kelly's name on top of it and passed it to the kid behind me, Ian. I heard a rustle as he slipped it across the aisle, and the person who sat across from Ian, Rebecca, sent it back to Kelly.

Apparently my teacher could also hear it, because he whipped around and instantly found Kelly with the paper as she was just about to open it. I cringed as he said," Miss Hudson, passing notes in class? How very uncharacteristic of you."

Truthfully, Kelly _didn't_ pass too many notes. She was kind of a good girl in school, but she's too funny to truly be a goody-two-shoes or whatever. "Sorry," she murmured, looking down as he cheeks flushed a bit. Our teachers held his hand out for the note as he walked down the aisle. A small flame of rebellion dancing in her eyes, Kelly looked up at him as he told her to give him the note. Her response was to stuff it in her mouth.

Several shocked but amused intakes of breath echoed around the classroom as our teacher stopped, clearing taken aback as Kelly chewed the paper some. "Miss Hudson!"

I covered my hand with my mouth to keep from laughing - I was in enough trouble for one day. "Detention today and tomorrow, for both passing notes and then _eating_ them!"

That was the final straw. The class broke out in hysterics, and I swore the principle, whose office was unfortunately right down the hall, was going to barge in and see what all the commotion was about. Kelly spit out the now wet note and held it out to our teacher with an innocent look on her face, but everyone could see the devilish glint of amusement in her eyes."Here you go."

Our teacher pointed to the door silently, but everyone knew he meant for her to go to the principle's office. Kelly stood up and walked out the door, still clutching the wet wad of paper (gross), and someone whooped her name. Our teacher glared at James, the kid in the black row, and he instantly shut up. "Now, if there will be no more distractions, I will continue with the lesson."

...

* * *

Kelly plunked down to me at lunch. "Hey," she said cheerfully. I raised my eyebrows at her.

"Seriously? You ATE the note?" I asked her in disbelief. She just grinned. "How much trouble did you get into?"

"Technically, I didn't eat it - just stuck it in my mouth and chewed it up some. The principal didn't say so, but I think it amused him. Anyway, I just got three detentions - one today, one tomorrow, and one Thursday. Don't worry, it'll be done in time for me to still go Christmas shopping with you and Andrea. Since this was only the second time this year I've gotten in trouble I got off fairly easy."

"I'll say," I agreed, biting into my sandwich, which, if you must know, was brought from home. I never got cafeteria food, except on Waffle Thursday - I'd be a fool to get it any other day. Kelly packs her own lunch, too, but Andrea and Hunter are crazy enough to buy the cafeteria trash. I swear they're trying to food poison us.

"Urgh, I hate Social Studies. Who CARES about how the government was created, as long as it's still standing? Who cares about the ancient Greeks or Romans? They're ANCIENT. Who cares about history? Hasn't this place heard the saying to 'live in the present'?" Kelly ranted, glaring at our teacher as he walked through the room haughtily. Pfft, who does he think he is? Some middle school popular girl?

"Well, in the defense of the Greeks and Romans, without them there would be no Percy Jackson," I said, frowning. I would like Social Studies okay if it weren't for our stupid teacher. Ever since I read Percy Jackson and the Kane Chronicles, I kind of like learning about the ancient times.

Kelly's eyes popped at my point.

"Forget what I said," Kelly said hastily, as if she didn't take it back Percy Jackson would jump out of a locker and slice her like a block of cheese, yelling about how insulted he was. Kelly, Andrea, and I were all huge Percy Jackson fans.

"What did you say?" Andrea's curious voice drifted to us through the many other loud voices.

"Nothing," Kelly said, moving on from her apple to a yogurt. Andrea sat next to Kelly as Hunter too wove his way to our table.

"Hey, guys," he greeted us.

"Hey, Hunter."

"Sup?"

"Hi!"

"Shannon, did you get in trouble for being late?" Hunter said worriedly as he sat down. I bit my lower lip nervously. I didn't want him to feel bad, but at the same time, I didn't want to lie to him.

"Well, yeah, but it's no biggie," I tried to convince him, but I don't think he was convinced.

"Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry," Hunter apologized, looking genuinely upset. Awww, how sweet is that?

"It's fine. I just have an hour long detention with Mr. Evil," I said causally, trying to make it sound like nothing, but Hunter winced.

"Detention? I'm so sorry, Shannon."

"It's fine."

"But really? A detention just for being two minutes late?"

"Yeah, most teachers would just scold you or give you a warning, but he just had to scoop out the detention. Oh, well. At least he won't be my teacher for too much longer. I just have to get through one more semester and I'll be FREE," I sighed, wistfully dreaming of the days when I would no longer have Mr. Jerk for a teacher.

"Well, I also got detention," Kelly said in an almost boastful way. I think she was trying to draw Hunter's attention away from his regret about making me late, which actually hadn't been his fault.

"Really? Why?" Hunter asked, looking surprised. Kelly explained what had happened with the note she had been caught with, and he started laughing. "That's hilarious! I can't believe you did that!"

Kelly grinned cheekily. "You better hope Doc finds that as amusing as Hunter," Andrea warned. Kelly's grin faltered.

"Yeah... Crap," she said, licking her lips as she tried to come up with a way to tell Doc and not get in trouble. I could practically see the gears working in her shifty little head. "Oh, hey, Shannon, what was in that note you tried to pass me, anyway?"

I glanced at Hunter out of the corner of my eyes. I didn't want to admit that I was freaking out about him liking me. "I'll tell you later," I said, hoping she'd get a hint. Kelly followed my gaze and her mouth opened in a silent, "_Oooh._"

"OK," she agreed, and she grinned. Blushing, I did, too.

...

* * *

**Kelly's P.O.V.**

Before my last period, I stole away into the bathroom and called Doc, telling him to not pick me up for an hour longer than normal.

"What'd you do this time?" Doc asked me tiredly.

"I, erm... I was caught passing notes, and got three detentions," I said, looking at myself in the mirror. My mouth was set in an uncharacteristically thin, nervous line, and I was standing stiffly, my back as rigid as a board.

"THREE detentions? What the heck was written in that note?!"

"Well, my teacher never actually read the note..."

"Why not?"

"...I ate it..."

Doc was silent, and I was glad I couldn't see his face. "You _ate_ it?"

"Well, technically, I just popped it in my mouth and chewed it up and spit it back out into my hand," I reasoned, deciding not to tell him I had handed to note to the teacher as a peace offering. I wondered if Doc would ground me long enough to miss Christmas...

Suddenly, Doc burst out into laughter, and my tense shoulders relaxed as I sighed in relief. "All right, I won't ground you this time, just don't do it again, okay?"

"Of course."

"I'll pick you up later. Bye."

"Bye."

...

* * *

Once Doc and I got home, we started to decorate our tree. During the day, Doc had strung white lights onto it, and now we hung up some colorful ornaments. Most of them were multi-colored round balls of different sizes, which Doc had been using before I had come into his life. Over the years, however, we had gathered a few more ornaments of a greater variety. There was the glass ballerina, which I put next to a light so it sparkled, Santa Claus, a few reindeer, Clara from the Nutcracker, dancing with her Nutcracker doll, two gingerbread men, a ceramic frame with a picture of Doc and me inside of it, and a few other things.

While we decorated the Christmas tree, we listened to Christmas carols on my iPod. Doc's favorite was _Deck the Halls_ by Mannheim Steamroller, and I've already told you I like _Carol of the Bells_. When my song came on, I started singing along.

_"Ding, dong, ding, dong. Ding, dong, ding, dong... Hark, how the bells, sweet silver bells, all seem to say, "Throw cares away". Christmas is here, bringing good cheer to young and old, meek and the bold," _I sang out._ "Ding, dong, ding, dong! That is their sing, with joyful ring, all caroling, one seems to hear words of good cheer from everywhere, filling the air. Oh, how they pound, raising the sound, o'er hill and dale, telling the tale. Gaily they ring while people sing songs of good cheer, Christmas is here. Merry, merry, merry, merry Christmas! Merry, merry, merry, merry Christmas!_"

I took a breather as Emmy Rossum sung on. "I love that song."

Doc chuckled. "I know, you say so about thirty times a year."

I blushed, grinning a bit as I hung a red ball on a lower branch. "Sorry, I'll stop."

"No, it's fine," Doc insisted. I smiled some more as my iPod moved onto _God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen,_ another favorite of mine. I started singing along again, smiling contently.

After I was finished with that, Doc commented, "You have a great singing voice."

I blushed at this rare compliment. "Thanks."

"You could probably make a good career out of that. You have a great voice, and you're a fine dancer," he said. I grinned widely at him.

"Thanks. It'd be a lot more fun than being a cashier at Kohl's."

"Well, I'm hoping you'll get more out of your education than to end up as a cashier anywhere."

"Me, too."

"I don't think I've ever asked you what you want to be when you get older," Doc said, obviously wanting to know. I frowned.

"Uh, I don't really know. It'd be fun to be a singer, but it might not be very profitable. Depends on how good I am. If I'm Lady Gaga good, then I can make all the money I'll ever need in two years. If I'm, I dunno, not Lady Gaga good, I'd have to work a lot longer and harder."

"Well, you've always had a knack for performing. Speaking of which, what time is your Nutcracker?"

I had almost forgotten about that, which was pretty stupid of me. My dance studio, Shining Stars Dance Academy, had a performance of the Nutcracker coming up this Saturday and Sunday. My class were Sugarplum Fairies (lucky us) because we were one of the older classes in the studio. Most of the girls we fifteen or sixteen - the only reason I got in is because I'm tall and look older than I really am, and, well, not to brag, but I'm a great dancer.

"It's at six, but I have to be at the high school at five thirty," I replied, smiling a bit. The studio would be performing in the Jackson High auditorium, and I was excited for this, because it was my first year dancing on toe in front of an audience. In cause you're wondering, dancing on toe, or pointe, is when a ballerina dances literally on her toes. I have to wear these tight shoes with a wooden platform on the bottom, and it hurts like heck, but it's worth it. If you still don't know what I'm talking about, just Google it or whatever. Ah, the beauty of the internet.

After a cheerful hour, Doc and I finished. We sat down on the sofa in between the windows, across from the coffee table, sipping hot chocolate (hot chocolate, hot cocoa, whatever. Doesn't matter what you call it. It was still tasty, and I still burned my tongue) and gazing at our masterpiece tree, which actually looked pretty great. Doc wrapped an arm around me and I snuggled into his side.

It was the perfect end to the day.

...

I don't own _Carol of the Bells _or_ God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen._

_Carol of the Bells_ citation: Rossum, Emmy. "Carol of the Bells." By Mykola Leontovych. _Carol of the Bells_. Geffen, 2007. Audio CD.


	4. Chapter 4: Day Four

**Wednesday, December 17, 2014 - Eight Days Until Christmas**

...

"Iiiiiiiiit's Humpday!" I sang to Shannon and Andrea as I walked up to my locker. Shannon snorted.

"Do you have to do that every single Wednesday?" she asked, amused.

"Every _what_ day?"

"Oh, good Lord."

Andrea laughed at our antics as I opened my locker, humming "_What Child is This?_"

"So, I have a rehearsal for the Nutcracker later, but I'm free after five, and I was thinking we should go see if Flo wants any help baking cookies," I suggested to my friends. They both nodded, Shannon's eyes wide.

"Cookies need sugar, right?" she asked in a dazed voice.

"Well, duh."

"Sugar... Sugar... SUGAR..." she moaned, staring off into space with visions of sugar plums dancing in her head. I snorted at the thought.

Shannon continued to fawn over sugar for another minutes until people started to stare. Andrea facepalmed and grabbed Shannon's shoulders. "Shannon! Snap out of it!" she shrieked, getting some laughs from the small crowd. Shannon blinked and shook herself out of her stupor, then noticed the small crowd.

"Hey! Scram! Don't y'all know it's impolite to stare?" she called, and the crowd dispersed. I rolled my eyes.

"Didn't you know it's impolite to yell?" I retorted in defense of the students.

"You really think I care?"

I sniggered at her as I bid my two friends good-bye and headed for my first class - Art. Ugh. I hated art. I could not draw, paint, sculpt, or do anything artistic with my hands. I knew in my creative little head what I wanted to come out on the paper or in the clay, but it always ends up looking like a... something it's not supposed to be. I'm much better at dancing, singing, and occasionally writing. Oh, and I can throw things. I was the pitcher on my softball team last summer, but heaven knows I can't catch anything, or hit anything with a bat or stick. I suck at all athletic things, except for throwing small things. My gym teacher and I hate each other, except for when we play softball. Then, I'm her favorite student.

I'll shut up now.

...

* * *

The lights turned on as the music started. I started in first position, where my feet are pointed outwards with my heels touching and my arms are rounded downwards, with my head also bent down, but as the music went "_bum_" for the fifth time, it snapped up and I looked up at the empty auditorium with a bright smile on my face. Sorry if that stunk, that's the only way I can describe it. As more instruments joined whatever it was that started the song (maybe the piano?), I rose up onto my tip toes in unison with my class. I pushed my feet outwards and then pulled them back together, landing with my left foot in front of my right, in an _echappe_, then repeated it, but with my right foot landing in front this time. For all you dancers, I repeated the _echappes_, then _bourreed_ into a triangle with the rest of my class, did a _sous sous _to the right, two _arabesques_, and a bunch more stuff. For all you non-dancers who have no idea what the heck I just said, I did a bunch of pretty ballerina things of the tips of my toes.

The song ended before I knew it, and I struck our ending pose, where we rose up in fifth position with our arms in fourth position. Again for you non-dancers, I struck a pretty ballerina pose. The lights dimmed, and my class trotted offstage as the next class silently took their places on the dark stage.

I smoothed my sparkley fuchsia tutu in the dark as I headed backstage. My costume was composed of a fuchsia leotard that had some rhinestones making a sort of triangle on the front of the leotard. The fabric the rhinestones were on was a darker purple than the rest of the costume, about the color of Holley's Jaguar. Then there was the tutu. The top layers was about the same color as the leotard, but the ruffles on the bottom layers were a lighter pink, and longer than the top layers. We wore white tights and obviously our pink pointe shoes. I loved the costume, but our tutu was so big and stiff, I felt like a walking table or something. I could have done my homework on that tutu.

I already knew the finale, when is when all the dancers come out and take a bow, so I just packed my pointe shoes away, put on a coat and my classic black Converse, and walked to the lobby, where I met Doc sitting on a bench. "Hi, Doc," I greeted him, smiling.

"Hey, how was it?"

"Good enough. I could probably have pointed my toes some more and put more passion in it, but I'll just remember that for show night. Oh, and I almost twisted my ankle when I slipped a bit doing an _echappe_."

"I don't see how you can point your toes at all in those," Doc said, motioning to the toe shoes in my bag. "Or do anything, really."

I giggled a bit at this as we walked out of the school and into the brisk winter breeze. I wished I had put on some jeans, even though that'd look pretty stupid with my huge tutu. Oh, well. "It's easy once you get used to it. Kind of."

"Must be a hard thing to get used to," Doc commented as he pulled out the keys to the Hudson Hornet. I still found it ironic that Doc had bought a car with his last name in it's own name... Maybe that's why he liked it. It was a cool car.

"Yeah. Pretty painful, but definitely worth it," I reasoned as Doc unlocked the car and I hopped in, expecting warmth as I scrunched my tutu up (it'd be wrinkly once I got out, but I didn't care - I'd just smooth it out). However, that was not what I received, as the car had been sitting out in the forty degrees weather for quite some time. For you people who live in colder climates, like Alaska, I know that doesn't sound like much, but here in the dessert, it's almost cold enough to cause a mass panic. If we had some snow, there would probably be an evacuation. No, I'm joking... Kind of.

Doc and I rode in a thoughtful silence on the way home, where I got changed out of my fancy dress and into a pair of heavily worn but comfortable jeans and a white hoodie with "Areopostale" written in pink cursive on the front. I then walked over to Flo's warm cafe, hoping she wouldn't be too busy so maybe Andrea, Shannon, and I could make some Christmas cookies with her. Nothing says "It's Christmas!" more than a sugar rush, except maybe... No, nothing says "It's Christmas!" more than a sugar rush. It's final, don't argue.

Thankfully, Flo's cafe was almost empty, except for two couples I didn't recognize (after years of knowing everyone in Radiator Springs, it still took me aback whenever I walk upon someone in my town whom's name I didn't know) and my two best friends, who were chatting in the same booth I had seen them in on Sunday morning. I walked over to them, smiling.

"Hey, guys," I greeted them. Shannon looked up at me, and she look slightly amused look when she spotted me. "What? Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Have you looked in a mirror recently?" she asked. I frowned and my hand jumped to my hair, and realization hit me. I hadn't taken my hair out of my bun or washed my face off after the rehearsal. I was still in my show make-up.

"Oooh. Dang it," I muttered, blushing. I'm not one of those girls who go walking around in make-up in the first place, but show make-up? Ugh. Even worse. I had blush, dark eye-shadow, and mascara on, which was a lot more than normal for me. I generally don't bother with make-up, so I guess you could say I'm something of a tomboy.

"No, it's fine, you look great," Andrea reassured me, and I smiled at her sweetness.

"I'll be right back, I want to get this stuff off," I said, and before either girl could reply, I turned around and jogged out the door, back to my house.

"Did you forget something?" Doc called when I walked through the door, slamming it behind me.

"My normal face," I hollered back.

"What?"

"I forgot to wash my make-up off and take my hair out of it's bun," I explained as I strode into my room, heading for the bathroom sink. I washed my make-up off and took the fake hair scrunchie out from around my bun, but left the bun in place. Hair was supposed to be up when you bake, anyway. I headed back to Flo's, bidding Doc good-bye again.

I reentered the restaurant to see Flo chatting with Andrea and Shannon, and I had a good idea of what they were talking about. My suspicions were confirmed when the two teens stood up and followed the dark-skinned waitress into the kitchen. I followed them into the warm room. "Hey, are you making cookies?" I called as I walked through the blue/green doors. Flo looked over her shoulder at me, grinning broadly.

"Yup! And I heard ya wanna help, hmm, honey?"

"Yes, please."

"That'd be great! First, y'all need to wash your hands. Next, we need to decide on what kind of cookies we should make," Flo directed, and we girls nodded.

"I think we should make gingerbread cookies," I suggested as I walked to the kitchen sink to wash my hands. I looked around the kitchen as I turned the knob on the sink and plunged my hands into the warm water. It looked like any restaurant kitchen - a bunch of ovens and stoves, counters, hanging pot racks filled with kitchen utensils, the works.

"Oh, great idea, Kelly, honey!" Flo congratulated me, beaming.

"Thanks."

"How bout sugar cookies?" Shannon suggested. "Ones we can frost?"

"And maybe some Hershey Kiss cookies?" Andrea said. Flo nodded, searching through her giant pantry.

"I believe I have all the necessary ingredients!" she declared as she gathered some up and placed them on the counter. I grabbed an apron as Flo rolled up the sleeves of her teal waitress uniform. We teenagers gathered around the counter, talking excitedly. Our first recipe would be sugar cookies. I inspected the recipe as Flo asked for me to grab a large bowl, and I obliged. Andrea fetched the butter and sugar, Shannon measured them, and then Flo creamed them in a bowl. I watched the beater's whisks whirl around the bowl in almost fascination, Christmas music running through my head. I soon realized it wasn't in my head - Andrea had turned on her iPhone's music, and the music added to the cheerful Christmas mood as we mixed, beat, rolled, shaped, and baked batch after batch of cookies. We had a near disaster when I used a half cup to measure some flour when I should have used a whole cup, but Flo caught me before I messed up the entire recipe, thank goodness.

After the last batch of gingerbread men went in the oven, Flo announced that the sugar cookies were cool enough to frost. I wasn't the best artist, but I had creativity. I dipped my butter knife in a bowl of homemade green frosting and smeared it across a Christmas tree. I then added some Twizzlers to act as tinsel, and M&Ms for ornaments. I frosted snowman after Christmas tree after reindeer. They weren't the neatest, but they were cheerful, and my lack of artistic skills wouldn't affect the taste.

After about two cheerful hours, we were all a little sweaty and red-faced, had sugar grains ground on the bottom of our shoes, and I had frosting streaked on my cheek, courtesy of a sugar high Andrea, but we were all laughing and happy. We brought our cookies out into the dinner and gave them away to friends and family. Doc picked up one of my snowmen, which had about an inch of frosty on it, and eyes, a mouth, and buttons that had somehow ended up in the wrong spots, and lifted an eyebrow at me.

"Is this yours?" he inquired. I nodded sheepishly.

"Too much frosting," he grunted, and before I could register hurt, he took a big bite out of the poor snowman's head. I laughed at him and swatted at his arm with my apron.

"Hey," I complained teasingly, grinning broadly as I grabbed the first Christmas tree I had frosted earlier and bit into it. It was amazing, and I almost moaned in delight as the cookie melted in my mouth, leaving a bit of Twizzler, two M&Ms, and a huge glob of green frosting. Mmm, sugar...

About twenty minutes later, we had three little children running wild around the cafe, grinning frosty smiles with cookies crumbs on their mouths as they laughed at absolutely nothing.

I was most certainly not one of them.

...

Sorry for the short chapter! It's been an insanely busy day for me, but hopefully tomorrow's chapter will be longer. Thanks for reading!

Reviews make my day. :3

Thanks for reading!

Kitty


	5. Chapter 5: Day Five

Okay, so I got a comment saying that Wednesday (yesterday's chapter) was seven days until Christmas, not eight. It is this year, but I'd just like to point out that this book takes place not this year, but next, 2014, because Kelly was born in 2000, like me, and she's fourteen in this, so naturally, it has to be 2014. I hope that cleared things up, and thanks for pointing that out to me!

Enjoy!

...

**Thursday, December 18, 2014 - Seven Days Until Christmas**

...

The school bell rang, and in unison, everyone jumped from their desks and rushed out the door, talking loudly over our teacher, who was trying to finish her lecture on proper grammar or something. Good luck with that, Ms. Endecot.

I met up with Shannon and Andrea outside the school. Ms. Harper and Mrs. Hussarya were sitting, chatting, in Shannon's family's car, as we walked up. Shannon grabbed the side door and pulled it open, greeting her mother as she slid into the car. Andrea came next, then me. "Hello," I greeted the two women in the front as I slammed the car door shut and shoved my bag halfway under the seat, and Ms. Harper started the SUV Audi.

"Hi, girls, how are you?" she asked.

"Good," I replied. "You?"

"I'm doing good, thanks for asking," Ms. Harper said as she navigated us out of the parking lot. "Ready to hit the mall?"

"Yeah!" we girls cheered, and Mrs. Hussarya laughed.

"You don't sound so sure about that," she teased.

"Oh, we're sure," I assured her. I grinned at Shannon. "Ready to get a dress?"

Of course, Shannon groaned. She's a big tomboy. "No, of course not!"

Ms. Harper beat me to replying. "Honey, you have to have a dress! It's your first date with a boy!"

"It's not a date, Mom."

"Then what is it?"

"Not a date... A... Um..."

"A date," I suggested helpfully, smirking.

"Oh, shut up."

"Mmm, I think not," I replied, still smirking at her. Shannon groaned and slumped in her chair.

"I'm sure Hunter will be fine with me if I show up in a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt," she insisted, looking at her mom hopefully. Ms. Harper shook her head, smiling slightly, causing another groan from Shannon. She opened her mouth again, but Ms. Harper turned on the radio before she could say anything. "_I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas_" came blaring on.

"Oh, I haven't heard this yet this year," Andrea mused, looking at the radio with a slight smile on her face.

"You like this song?"

"Yeah, I think it's cute," she said, nodding.

"Cool."

About twenty five minutes later, we reached Clinton Mall. We jumped out of the car and walked into the mall. I put my blue purse over my shoulder, clutching it slightly as I looked around. I hadn't ever really gone to the mall before I met Shannon and Andrea, and I was still kind of cautious of thieves at them. I know how stupid that sounds, but I had only been to the mall about three times in my life. Besides school, I had only been out of Radiator Springs less then fifty times since I had been adopted.

We entered the warm mall at the food court, and I breathed in the smell of Auntie Anne's cinnamon pretzels and Johnny's pizza. My mouth watered as my stomach reminded me I hadn't eaten since lunch, around twelve. My brain told me that wasn't a very long time, but my stomach insisted it was as good as a year.

"Where do you want to go first? Barnes and Nobel?" Shannon suggested. I gave her a look, knowing she was trying to divert our attention from her dress.

"Sure. After Boston Store," Ms. Harper said, seeing right through Shannon's little trick. Shannon sighed as everyone started walking in the direction of Boston Store.

"Nice try," Andrea congratulated Shannon, who glared at her. Andrea smiled innocently and speed up to me. I chuckled at her joke as Shannon also speed up to us, but she faltered as she entered the danger zone - Boston Store.

"I really don't want to get a dress here. Or anywhere, really," Shannon said, playing with her black her, which was in a side braid.

"All right," Ms. Harper agreed, and much to my surprise she started to walk out the door. "I've been needing something from Victoria's Secret, let's go th -"

"NO!" Shannon shrieked in horror so loudly that a clerk looked up in confusion, and a few other people stared. She blushed as Ms. Harper gave her an admonishing look for her overreaction. "Sorry. I'm good, let's stay here."

Ms. Harper nodded and turned around, continuing into Boston Store. Andrea snigger and Shannon gave her a withering glare. Andrea quickly followed Ms. Harper and Mrs. Hussarya into the junior's department. We found the dresses, and I instantly pounced upon a simple black one that I thought Shannon might like. "Hey, is this good?" I asked, holding it up. Shannon nodded slowly, frowning, but Ms. Harper shook her head.

"No, that's not right for a dance," she said, and I nodded and put it back. I continued looking through the rack, stopping at a knee-length red dress with a black sash that looked a bit like my homecoming dress. I lifted it up and showed Shannon, but her eyes widened.

"Did you look at the back?" she asked in almost horror. I frowned and looked at it, biting my lip when I realized what was wrong with it. It had a huge open back that was way too mature for Shannon, and truthfully, it took away from the beauty of the dress. I put it back silently and kept on looking.

"How about this?" Andrea suggested, and I looked up to see her holding up a long pink dress with a heavily decorated front, with crystal-like rhinestones and beads and a wide purple, sparkly sash. I almost had to squint at it to see it, it was so sparkly and bright. I averted my gaze to look at Shannon, who was glaring at Andrea. If looks could kill, Andrea would be a dead woman. She hastily put it away and hurried to hide behind me, looking at Shannon, who was still glaring, from over my shoulder. I rolled my eyes and stepped to the right, revealing the blonde, who gave me a "_Hey!_" look.

Ms. Harper walked over with a warm ivory dress. The top was a flowy chiffon, and the bottom was a knee length sort of pencil skirt with gold sequins creating a swirling design on it. There was a small gold belt separating the flowy top from the stiffer bottom, and I knew Shannon would like the belt. I also could already tell that Shannon would look adorable in it. Shannon looked at it with almost interest. "Could I try it on?" she asked in an almost timid voice, like she was nervous if she tried it on, her tomboy reputation would be ruined.

"Of course!" Ms. Harper said, sounding delighted as she ushered her only daughter into the dressing room. Mrs. Hussarya walked up to Andrea, holding a sleeveless fuchsia dress that had a long tail hem. I sucked in my breath - I loved dresses with tail hems. "Hey, Kelly, I'm going to go try this dress on, just for giggles," Andrea called over to me.

"Okay," I called back, staring at the dress in envy.

"Will you be okay out here alone?" Mrs. Hussarya asked me, and I nodded, determined to not think about kidnappers and robbers... Oooh, too late. Mrs. Hussarya and Andrea walked to the dressing room, talking to each other.

I watched them almost sadly. I wished I had a mother like that, but no, my idiot of a mother got herself drunk and in a car crash. Not that I cared. She hadn't been a very good mother. I don't really know why my birth parents had had me. They weren't prepared - my mother hadn't even been out of college when she had me. They weren't prepared, and they didn't bother to learn about how to raise a kid. They treated me almost like a dog - leaving me home for long amounts of time when I wasn't at school, I often had to feed myself, and I had to basically raise myself until that fateful night when they had gotten drunk with a few friends and thought it'd be fun to have a car race through the Pennsylvania mountains.

It had been winter, and the roads were slippery with ice. They raced their friends, and instead of sailing triumphantly over the finish line, they had found themselves sailing over a cliff. I had only been five when my tearful grandparents had walked through the unlocked front door, bringing news of my parents' deaths. I had, of course, been very distraught, as they were my parents, but I really hadn't known them all that well. I was brought to an orphanage, because none of my grandparents wanted to take me in. I had spent a year and a half in that orphanage, until Doc adopted me.

I was jerked out of my thoughts as Carol of the Bells came on the radio. I found myself dancing to it, ignorant of the fact that there were other people in the store, and that it wasn't a very big dance floor. After about thirty seconds, I ended up in a rack of clothes. Blushing furiously, I slunk out of it, choosing to ignore the snickering young boys who were unfortunate enough to both see my epic fail and to be shopping with their mother. In the corner of my eyes, I saw their mother clutching a Victoria's Secret bag. The boys had had to go into that store? Poor fellows were probably scarred now.

I walked into the dressing room, my face still red, to see Shannon inspecting the dress. My eyes widened in both shock that she was actually WEARING a dress and no one was lying on the floor in a pool of their own blood and that the dress looked fantastic on her.

"Wow, you look great," I said in amazement, and Shannon smiled a bit.

"Thanks," she replied, looking back at me. "Hey, you okay? Your face is red."

Naturally, I blushed some more. "Um, yeah, I'm fine."

Another door opened, revealing a grinning Andrea. "How does it look?" she asked, twirling around in a circle with the tail hem fanning out behind her.

"It looks awesome!" Shannon told her.

"Thanks, so does yours."

I looked down at my casual jeans and purple sweatshirt, which had a small stain on the cuff from when I had accidentally gotten some peanut butter on it, courtesy of Aidan Spencer. He needed to get a new hobby... Anyway, I suddenly felt quite plain, and Shannon snorted when I voiced this concern. "I feel too fancy," she said in distaste, but anyone could tell by the way she kept smoothing invisible wrinkles in the dress and twirling in it slightly she loved her dress.

"So are you both going to get those dresses?" I asked, looking at my two best friends.

"Nah, I don't really have any use for it. I'm not going to the dance," Andrea said almost wistfully. She twirled again, and it sunk down a few inches. She blushed and pulled it back up. "Erm, and it's kinda big on me."

"Maybe next time," Mrs. Hussarya said, also looking a bit disappointed that the dress didn't fit. Andrea nodded and walked back into the her dressing room.

Shannon looked at her mom, her eyes almost pleading. I raised my eyebrows - Shannon must really like this dress if she actually wants it. Her mom nodded, and she squealed a bit. "Who was that?" Andrea called from her dressing room.

"Shannon," I called. Andrea shrieked and her dressing room door banged open as she poked her head out to look at Shannon in shock.

"You squealed? Over a _dress?_" she asked in astonishment. Shannon glared, and Andrea retreated back into her dressing room to take her dress off. I snorted and walked out of the dressing rooms, wondering how long it was before Andrea's mouth got her in some serious trouble. "_Deck the Halls_" was playing on the radio, and I wanted to dance to it, but those boys were still out there, staring at a manikin wearing a showy dress, so I decided against it.

...

Next, we went to a shoe store to look for dolphins. No, I'm joking - we were looking for shoes, obviously. Andrea instantly pounced upon some pink six inch high heels and grabbed them. "Shannon, close your eyes and go sit on that bench," Andrea instructed, hiding her discovery. Shannon gave her a suspicious look, but obliged. Andrea slipped Shannon's shoes off and put the heels on. "Open your eyes."

Shannon opened her eyes and instantly looked at her feet. "HEY!" She punched Andrea in the arm, and she fell over. As Ms. Harper apologized to Andrea for Shannon and scolded Shannon, Andrea laid on her back and looked up at me.

"I think I have a death wish."

I nodded seriously. "Yes, yes you do. You didn't already notice?"

"I noticed, but I didn't think it was that bad until today."

"Mmm."

I browsed through the store, fingering my purse. Finally, Shannon bought some ballet flats, but I saw Ms. Harper also purchase some three inch heels when Shannon wasn't looking. Then, we started the Christmas shopping.

Our first stop was Barnes and Nobel, which was a good place fore me to shop, since I luckily had a thirty dollar gift card for there. I instantly hit the movies section, looking for the _Percy Jackson and the Sea of Monsters_ movie for Shannon. Even though it had been out for over a year, she didn't have it yet. I saw it, and instantly pounced upon it, squealing quietly. I loved Percy Jackson... HE WAS SO HOT.

Did I just say that out loud?

Whoops...

Eh, everyone knew that about me anyway. I am such a huge fangirl. EEEP!

Sorry.

I paid for the movie and moved onto the actual books. I knew Doc wanted this book about Lewis and Clark, but being the dumb teenager I am, I had no idea what the title was. I saw one about Lewis and Clark, but I wasn't positive it was the one he wanted, so I left it on the shelf. I didn't find anything else to buy, although I saw this book about the making of the first _Mockingjay_ movie that I personally wanted, but I wasn't shopping for myself. I found the rest of the group as Shannon bought a book for her dad, and I quickly hid the Percy Jackson movie behind my back. A feeble hiding spot, but effective - she didn't see it.

We moved on to Bath and Body Works. I grabbed a Peppermint Twist candle just so I could use the Bath and Body Works bag to hid the movie in. Besides, it smelled good. And I had a coupon.

Outside Bath and Body Works was a small Lindt chocolate stand, where I purchased two bags of milk chocolate truffles - one for Doc, and another to give out to my group as a small present on the night of the Nutcracker. They were being super nice and handing out some free samples of their truffles, and I accepted their generosity gratefully. I unwrapped it and popped it in my mouth, savoring the sweet as it melted on my tongue. I don't bit into Lindt truffles, I just let it melt in my mouth. I don't know why, it's just a quirk of mine.

By then, it was about five, so we had to finish up our shopping spree. I noticed that Shannon slipped something from the Lindt chocolate stand into her Barnes and Nobles bag, and her face reddened when I asked her what it was. "Nothing," she said hastily. "Er, I mean it's for my dad, too."

I acted like I believed her, but I was certain it was for me. I was happy to have an idea of what I was getting, but I felt bad for ruining the surprise.

"All right, do you guys want to keep shopping or eat in the food court?" Ms. Hussarya asked us.

"Shopping. I still need to find stuff for Lightning, Mater, Holley, and something else for Doc," I said, frowning. I was running out of money, plus I had no idea what to get any of those people.

"Okay. Does anyone want to eat?" No one wanted to eat, so we moved onto Kohls. I noticed a stand with pictures of Lightning's car, with his signature on it, and I considered getting that for him as a joke. I decided not to, since that was so cheesey. Also, I didn't have the money.

I strolled hastily through the store, clueless of what to get for the four people I still needed stuff for. I was walking past the jewelry case when something caught my eye. I walked backwards a few steps to stare at the amethyst earrings I could already see on Holley. However, that idea drifted away when I saw the price. Stupid Kolhs and it's prices... Don't they know that money isn't anything?

I decided to just suggest them to Mater and moved on, but then I noticed a (fake) amethyst necklace. It was on a long (fake) gold chain, with the (fake) gem dangling gracefully at the end, and the (real!) price was actually pretty cheap, but still a little expensive. I whipped out my phone and sent a text to Shannon and Andrea.

"**Hey, do u guys wanna collaborate on a gift for Holley i saw?**"

I stared at my screen after I sent it, hoping for a speedy response. After a minute, I got one back from Shannon.

"**Sure, what?**"

"**Fake amythst or however the heck u spell it necklace.**"

"**LOL sure. Drea?**"

"**Sure**," Andrea agreed.

"**K, I'll get it, but u both will owe me about $7**."

"**K.**"

I purchased the necklace and continued on. I didn't find anything for the rest of the people on my list, but I was getting close to having all my shopping done. I also found a cheap white T-shirt, which I also bought for myself. I smiled as I met up with the rest of my group, and we exited the store. I gasped, though, as we walked through the security when the alarms went off.

I looked around, then glared at Shannon. "What did you take?" I accused teasingly. She looked shocked and a bit hurt, but in a joking way.

"_Moi_?"

"Stop speaking Spanish, you just got us in trouble!" I hissed as store officials strode up, thankfully without any handcuffs.

"It's French, genius."

"Oh, we must have forgotten a security tag," one said. "Here, I can help with that."

We offered up our bags and receipts, and they quickly searched through them. The first lady that had spoken pulled my T-shirt out of it's bag. "Ah, here we go. I'll go take this off."

I blushed as our bags were returned to us. Shannon smirked at me, and I muttered," Sorry."

"It's fine, I know you were joking."

"Mm."

The lady came back with my bag, and I accepted it. "Thanks, and sorry for setting the alarms off."

"It's fine," she assured me. "No harm done."

I nodded and walked out of the store. "Well, that was our little added excitement for the day," Ms. Harper said, trying to lighten my mood. I smiled at her.

"OMG, look at those rings," Andrea pointed at a Tiffany window display. There were five golden rings in the center of the window. "Can we go in and look at those?"

"We can see them very well from out here," I pointed out, but Andrea was already though the door. I rolled my eyes and followed.

"Hello, there, how may we help you?" a store person greeted us.

"We're just looking," I said. She nodded, smiling pleasantly.

"All right, then, have fun," she said, and with that she walked away.

Andrea walked towards the window display and gazed at the rings for a moment, then started to wander around the store a bit.

"Hey, Drea, I think we actually have to go pretty soon," I pointed out, but she waved me off. What was up with that? She generally didn't act like this. Maybe she was looking for a present to suggest for her dad to give her mom.

I sighed and also took a look around. They had some gorgeous amethyst earrings that were similar to the ones in Kohls, but twice as fancy and expensive. After ten minutes of browsing the fancy store, Mrs. Hassarya had to gather us all up and hustled us out the door. "Time to go, girls," she said as she found Andrea and gently lead her in the direction of the door. We nodded and obeyed her instructions I warily glanced at the sensors as we walked them, and much to my astonishment, they went off again!

Everyone turned to look at me, and my hands flew up in surrender. "I swear it was not me. You know I'm not a robber," I insisted as two store officials walked up. They were both wearing dark sunglasses, and the woman was wearing a navy blue blouse with a black pencil skirt and was wearing some plain black high heels. The man was wearing a black business suit, and HE HAD A MUSTACHE. They looked so official and imposing that my stomach twisted in nervousness. What would they do to you if you were found stealing from Tiffany? I mean, none of us had stolen anything, right? But why then had the alarms gone off?

"Sorry about that, you'll have to come with us," the woman said in a brisk tone.

Generally I would have held my hands up in a joking surrender and say, "I didn't do it," but this was Tiffany. I had a feeling joking about robbing something at Tiffany was a big no-no.

As the lady ushered us to the back of the store, to the offices, I noticed she sounded a bit familiar. I gazed at her, my eyes squinted, mentally willing for her to take off her shades. Her curly dark-brown ponytail also reminded me of someone, but I couldn't remember who for the life of me, I was so nervous.

The man opened the office door and we walked in. Ms. Harper opened her mouth as the two officials walked in, but I beat her to it the woman took off her sunglasses, revealing sparkling emerald eyes. " I knew there was something familiar about you!"

"Yes, sorry about that, but C.H.R.O.M.E. apparently has a rule against greeting friends in the normal way," Holley Shiftwell said, laughing a bit as she allowed her British accent to show. I also laughed and went up to hug her.

"Oh my gosh, it's great to see you again. How are you? I thought you weren't coming until the twentieth," I said as I released her and moved to Finn.

"Yes, we were, but we didn't have any missions to take care of, so we had Siddeley fly us here two days early. I hope that's alright with you?" Finn said as he too took off his sunglasses. "Did you grow?"

I rolled my eyes. Why is it that grown-ups, even super cool spy grown-ups, always notice your growth spurts? "If you must know, yes, I grew about two inches in October. Moving on from that, that's really cool! Is Siddeley here, too?"

Someone popped out from behind the desk. "Yup!"

Shannon, who had been leaning on the desk, shrieked and jumped away. "What the - who the heck are you?!"

I remembered that Shannon and Siddeley hadn't met. "This is Siddeley," Finn introduced. "He's one of C.H.R.O.M.E.'s best pilots."

"C.H.R.O.M.E.? Could someone please explain what is going on here?" Mrs. Hussarya asked in confusion. Finn explained who he, Holley, and Siddeley were in minor detail, obviously not wanting or being unable to reveal too much about their special jobs.

"So is it all right if we're here early?" Holley asked me again. I nodded, grinning.

"Off course. Mater will be delighted to see you. Well, everyone will, really," I said. Holley smiled.

"All right, then. Great!"

I smiled at her. "Yeah. Can we go now?"

Finn nodded. "Off course."

"Please tell me we won't have to go out the window," Andrea said, looking at the window in suspicion. Holley shook her head and put her shades back on.

"No... Unless you want to."

"...Yeah!"

...

Hey guys! Hope you liked this! Sorry if I have five million typos, but I didn't have time to edit this chapter. I'd explain about my long busy day, but my mom's pushing me to go upstairs and get to bed now, so I won't. Anyways, hope you liked it! Please leave a little review for me, they never fail to make me smile.

Thanks for reading!

Kitty


	6. Chapter 6: Day Six

**Friday, December 19, 2014 - Six Days Until Christmas **

...

The good news: School was cut early, so we got on winter break about four hours earlier than expected.

The bad news: School was cut early because there was a gas leak in the gym, meaning that the dance would not take place.

Shannon looked stunned and upset at the news. "Oh, come on... The one thing I was looking forwards to with this school was that dance, and then they _cancel_ it?"

We were sitting in the Hussarya's car, driving home from school. "I'm sorry, Shannon," I apologized, rubbing her back. I had never imagined I would be comforting Shannon Harper over the cancellation of a school dance.

"It's just a bit of gas! Can't they just vacuum the air or something?"

"Erm, I don't think so..."

"Why not? They don't evacuate the school whenever a boy in gym class passes gas!"

"I really don't think it's the same thing. The gas from the leak is probably toxic."

"And the boy's gases aren't?"

"This is the weirdest conversation I have ever heard," Andrea commented, breaking up Shannon's and my little argument.

"What about that one between Sam and your Uncle Bill?" Mrs. Hussarya asked. Andrea nodded her head, snorting.

"Alright, this is the second weirdest conversation I have ever heard."

"What about the - "

"Fine, this is _one of_ the weirdest conversations I have ever heard! Better?"

"Much better."

I smiled at the two Hussarya's conversation, which was one of the weirdest _I_ had ever heard, but Shannon's expression didn't change. I sighed and sank back into the seat, wondering how I could help my friend get her romantic night...

Then I remembered another romantic night.

_"Okay, what's going on ?" Sally had asked us, amused, as the residents of Radiator Springs, not including Doc (who wasn't present at all), Red or Lizzie, who were on Lizzie's front porch, all crowded in front of Ramone's. Mater cleared his throat._

_"Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the new Lightning McQueen!" _

_We stepped apart as an engine revved, letting Lightning show off his newly redone car, and himself, too. He was wearing a pair of casual jeans, a sweatshirt from Lizzie's shop with _Radiator Springs _written on it, but he still had his racing hat on. Sally's hand flew to her mouth as he pulled out of Ramone's parking lot. _

_"What do you think? Radiator Springs looks pretty good on me," Lightning said as he drive his car around Sally, who was amazed. _

_"I'll say, Rrr, ka-chow," she laughed. "You're going to fit right in in California. Oh my goodness, it looks like you helped everyone in town."_

_"Well," Lightning said as he cut the engine and climbed out with more ease than I could have ever pulled off," everyone but one."_

_Sally's eyes widened as he said in a loud voice," Hey, is it getting dark out?"_

_"What did he say?" Lizzie asked no one in particular, looking around in confusion. Crazy old lady..._

_"Let me say that again. Is it getting dark out?" he repeated in a louder voice._

_"Now what was I supposed to do after that?" Lizzie murmured, and Red chuckled and turned the radio on. _

_All around us, the old neon lights flickered on as "Sh-Boom", I think it was called (seriously didn't know why Lightning picked that song - what about some good old Selena Gomez?) played. Sally looked around in complete surprise as the town was transformed. It was like something out of a movie._

_Everyone started dancing or just walking down the newly paved road. I nicked a cupcake off of Flo's tray and went to eat it in a doorway as I observed everyone else. I wished that Doc was there. Maybe he and I would do one of those father/daughter dances, but he had been unnaturally bitter ever since Lightning had come to town. I frowned as I remembered finding out about his racing history, wondering why he had never told me, but I shook myself out of those thoughts. Tonight was a night to enjoy. _

_I looked at Lightning and Sally, who were dancing and laughing under a neon light, and I smiled widely as they leaned in closer. Too bad I didn't have my iPod on me then... _

"What are you grinning about?"

I looked at Andrea, forcing the grin from the memory of that one wonderful night to slid off my face. "Nothing," I lied. Maybe I didn't know how to set up a romantic night for Shannon and Hunter, but I knew someone who could.

...

"You want me to help you get Shannon and Hunter on a date?" Lightning asked me, looking up from some racing paperwork he was doing. I nodded.

"Yeah, I figured you know more than me about romance than me. I've only read about it in books," I said, blushing a bit as I let my eyes scan Lightning's office. I was in his new racing stadium, in Lightning's office. It was fairly bare, except for the files drawer by Lightning's desk, the desk itself, and the red walls. The walls had several pictures hanging on them - one of Lightning and Sally sitting in a booth together at Flo's, laughing and talking, oblivious to the camera, one of Lightning, Doc, and me standing by Lightning's car at a race, one of most of the original Radiator Springs residents, and another of Lightning and Sally, this time posing for the camera. I had to admit I was surprised the office wasn't all messed up yet - offices don't seem to be Lightning's thing. I had figured it would have looked like a tornado a blown through it by now, but it looked fairly nice. Sally probably had something to do with that.

"You've never dated before?" Lightning asked, looking surprised. I shook my head and looked back at Lightning. "Wow, I would have thought some guy would have asked you out by now."

"Oh, I've been asked out before, but just not by the right guy," I informed Lightning somewhat defensively, not mentioning that it had only been one guy, Aidan. However, he asked me out about ten times a month, so he had to count for more than one person.

"Okay. Moving on from that, maybe we could get Hunter in Radiator Springs, and have a sort of surprise party for Shannon tonight in the streets, with the neon lights and all," Lightning plotted. I facepalmed.

"How did I not think of that?" I muttered, and Lightning laughed.

"It takes the mind of a genius," he said in a superior tone, tapping the side of his head. I looked around.

"What genius? I don't see a genius."

Lightning snorted. "Very funny, Kelly. Anyway, I hope that helps."

"Yeah, it does. Thank you," I said and strode out of the office. So I just had to organize a party... Great.

...

We already had cookies from Wednesday night, so dessert was taken care of. I asked Flo what party food we could have, and she instantly went into Flo-mode.

"I could make pizza... I'll need yeast, flour, salt, sugar..." Flo walked into her pantry.

"Do you have any chips, too?" I asked.

"Nope, but someone could drive to Walmart and get some." I could tell Flo wasn't too pleased about the idea of people eating something she herself hadn't seen being made, but she had bigger concerns.

"Alright, I'll get someone to do that. Do you need any help with the pizza?"

"I'm alright, honey, you go on and continue making the other preparations," Flo said as she continued to rustle around her pantry.

"Okay, thanks, Flo," I said, and I strode out of the kitchen to my next stop, Ramone's, where I talked to Ramone about decorations. Next, I had to visit DJ, much to my distaste. I didn't think too much of any of the DRH, except for 'Snot Rod'. He seemed pretty okay to me, and I truthfully didn't know why he hung out with the other three DRH. Anyway, I went to DJ's house and asked if he could be in charge of the party's music. He accepted happily, and I moved onto my next visit.

By six o'clock, everything was planned. I had Hunter and the rest of the guests on Main Street, which was beautifully decorated, thanks to Ramone. Tinsel hung across the streets, connected by street lamps, which had multi-colored lights running up and around them. Large paper snowflakes dangled from the tinsel, door canopies, and anything dangling over seven feet. On the sidewalks were tables groaning from the weight of the food on them, courtesy of Flo. There were pizzas of all kinds, chips, cookies, and punch. Also on the sidewalk was small stage with a karaoke machine that I was dying to use, but first, I had to alert Andrea that she could let Shannon come.

I sent my friend a text, which she quickly replied, informing me that they would be right there. A minute later, the two walked down the street. Shannon was staring at the decorations in surprise and confusion. She looked through the happily chatting crowd and our eyes met. Shannon's eyes widened and she weaved through the crowd, which was actually pretty big. I grinned as she pushed her way next to me.

"Oh my gosh, Kelly, did you do this?" she asked me in utter shock. I nodded happily.

"Do you like it? I know it's not the dance, but - " I was interrupted by Shannon wrapping her arms around me and squeezing me.

"It's amazing, thanks so much."

"No problem. Now if you are done thanking me, there's someone who would like to see you," I said as I stepped to the right, allowing Hunter to come into her view. Shannon's mouth fell open.

"Hunter?"

"Hey," he greeted his date happily. He reached into his front jeans pocket and brought out a small pink package. He opened it, presenting Shannon with a pretty lilac corsage. "Your favorite flower is lilac, right?"

Shannon nodded, speechless, as Hunter slipped the corsage on her wrist. "Wanna dance?" he offered.

"Sure," Shannon squeaked out, then clamped a hand over her mouth, her cheeks flushing at the girly reaction. Hunter laughed and led her into the streets to dance. People were crowded into the streets as they jumped and danced around, laughing and talking. My inner dancer wanted to get out there and show people how you _really_ dance, but I refrained, instead going over to Lightning to thank him for helping me set the party up.

"Hey, thanks for the help with this," I said, gesturing to the partying people in the street. Lightning smiled at me as he plucked a cookie off a tray on the table by him.

"It's no problem," he replied, and I hugged him before I walked into the crowd.

"Hello, there."

"Aidan, go AWAY!" I growled loudly as I whipped around only to find myself facing Finn, who looked amused at his trick. "What the - How did - _What?_"

Finn laughed. "I was informed about your relationship with Mr. Spencer, and decided to us your feelings towards him for some personal amusement."

I facepalmed. The idiot had mimicked Aidan's voice... Normally, I would have found voice manipulation cool, but not this time. "I expected more from you, McMissile."

Finn raised an eyebrow. "Oh, really? Such as?"

"Not acting like Lightning."

From behind us, Lightning did a spit take on his punch, nearly taking out an unappreciative tourist. "_What?_"

Finn grinned as he looked at Lightning, who was looking at me incredulously. I smiled innocently at him. "Did I ever mention that you're one of my best friends, Lightning?"

Lightning rolled his eyes. "Did I ever tell you that you are incredibly sassy?" he asked before quickly rushing away into the crowd - a good choice. My mouth popped open in disbelief.

"Oh, no you didn't!" I shrieked, trying to follow him, but being blocked by an older couple who were trying to make it across the street without being flattened by the party-goers. Fuming, I stalked back over to Finn. "I can't believe he sunk that low."

"It wasn't that low."

"Are you on my side or not?"

"I'm on my side."

I rolled my eyes, but I was grinning. "I think I'm going to go get that karaoke started up," I announced, turning away from the secret agent. "See you later."

I strode towards the karaoke machine, which DJ was manning. "Hey, what songs do you have?"

"We have thousands of songs! What's your favorite?" DJ asked, inspecting the karaoke machine lovingly, like he himself had made it.

"Do you have_ Jingle Bells Rock_? By Brian Setzer?" I asked as I hopped onto the stage, smiling. DJ nodded, also grinning.

"Sure do!" He announced as he stopped the song that was playing. "Hey, everyone, who's having fun?"

Everyone cheered and clapped. "I can't hear you!" Naturally, everyone cheered louder. "Still can't hear you!" This cheer sounded as loud as the first to me, but DJ seemed to think it was loud enough. "Great! Glad to hear it! Now please give it up for our first karaoke volunteer, Kelly Hudson!"

Everyone clapped politely as I took the microphone. "Thanks, DJ."

"Any time," he said happily as he started the song. I smiled. Maybe DJ wasn't too bad, after all.

"_Jingle bell, jingle bell, jingle bell rock, jingle bells swing and jingle bells ring. Snowing and blowing up bushels of fun, now the jingle hop has begun!_" I started out a little softly and shyly, but after a few chords, I became more comfortable with my position on the stage and started to really rock out. "_What a bright time, it's the right time, to rock the night away! Jingle bell time is a swell time, to go gliding in a one-horse sleigh. Giddy-up jingle horse, pick up your feet, jingle around the clock. Mix and a-mingle in the jingling feet. That's the jingle bell, that's the jingle bell, that's the jingle bell rock!_"

The crowd cheered for me, clapping, as I, red-faced with excitement, thanked them for listening and handed the microphone back to Dj. "Thanks," I thanked him. He nodded his head at me.

"Any time."

I jumped off the stage and reentered the crowd, but instead of slipping through it unnoticed as I had before, people would congratulate me and clap me on the back. I thanked them, my mouth almost hurting from grinning so much. Suddenly, someone's hand grabbed me from around the waist and my feet went flying in the air.

"Lightning!" I shrieked in glee, my happy mood making everything so much more cheerful and laughable, as my hands flew on top of his, trying to find balance.

Lightning laughed and set me down. "You're getting heavy," he teased, but I knew he didn't mean it. "Great job up there, you did really well."

"Thanks. I had a fun time."

"I bet."

"Is this what it's like being famous?" I asked as another person congratulated me.

"Yeah, pretty much, just more fangirls," Lightning said, making a sour face.

"What's wrong with fangirls?" I asked, confused. I was personally a fangirl of many things - Logan Lerman, Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, the Hunger Games, Logan Lerman, Divergent... Did I mention Logan Lerman? SQUEEEEEE!

"Nothing, until they try to kiss you in front of the paparazzi and your girlfriend," Sally informed me as she emerged from the crowd. "Nice job with that karaoke."

"What? And thanks."

"True story. Not a good one, but true," Sally said, not looking particularly pleased about the memory as she slipped her hand through Lightning's and squeezed it. Lightning kissed her on the forehead and pulled her close, and she smiled at him.

"At least that one didn't try to steal my wallet," he pointed out. My mouth fell open in slightly amused disbelief.

"Who tried to steal your wallet?" Lightning shrugged.

"Random, squealy teenage girl. At least, I think she was going for my wallet... I hope she was going for the wallet."

"Ooookay, that... Is..." I tried to find the right word, biting the inside of my cheek as I mentally dug around for it. "Disturbing." There, found it.

Lightning nodded, then looked at Sally as a slower, romantic Christmas song came on. It was by Bridget Mendler, featuring Shane Harper (no, he's not related to Shannon, sadly), called "_My Song For You._"

"You want to go dance?" he asked his girlfriend, who smiled happily and accepted. "Okay, then, bye, Kelly."

"Bye," I said as they went to find a spot on the dance floor and started slow-dancing. I smiled at the happy couple as someone grasped my shoulder from behind. I squealed a bit in surprise and turned to see Doc, who withdrew his hand.

"Sorry," he apologized as I calmed down. "Just wanted to say you did great up there."

I smiled at him, almost wincing. Oooh, I wouldn't be able to smile for ages after tonight. My smile muscles were cramping up. "Thanks."

Doc offered his hand for me, and I took it, and we also started dancing. I looked around a bit. Shannon and Hunter were both smiling softly and talking happily with each other, Holley and Mater were sitting in a doorway, leaning on each other and silently but contently watching everyone else dance, Lightning and Sally were lost in there own world, and Finn was trying to get away from some crazy (apparently single) lady that must have gotten into a bunch of eggnog. I looked back up at Doc and smiled at him. He smiled back as the song drew to a close.

"_We've got mistletoe (mistletoe) and firelight (firelight), on this cold December night. The snow outside will set the mood as I sing my song (sing my song), sing my song for yoooou._"

...

Hey guys! I hope you liked this chapter.

I've got some exciting news for my Different fans! I have discovered an app that will let me download Youtube videos to my computer, and I am using some videos to make a (drumroll, please) book trailer for Different! I'm super excited! It won't be entirely accurate, but so far, I have been unsuccessful in finding a movie in which humans and talking cars interact with each other, so I'll just have to make do. I'll work on it over the holidays, and I'll give you my Youtube username when it's done so you can look it up f you want to.

Please review, and thanks for reading!

Kitty

Citations:

Jingle Bell Rock: Setzer, Brian. "Jingle Bell Rock." By Joseph Carleton Beal and James Ross Boothe. _Dig That Crazy Christmas_. Surfdog, 2005. Audio CD.

My Song For You: Mendler, Bridget and Harper, Shane. "My Song For You." By Kari Kimmel and Scott Krippayne. _Disney Channel Holiday Playlist_. Walt Disney Records, 2012. Audio CD.


	7. Chapter 7: Day Seven

**Saturday, December 20, 2014 - Five Days Until Christmas**

...

I bid Doc good-bye as I entered the doors that led to the prop room, the room behind the stage where us dancers would be staying when we weren't performing.

"You'll be great!" he called encouragingly after me. I looked over my shoulder and smiled broadly at him before I stepped through the doors.

"Backstage pass?" a middle-aged woman asked. I dug around in my coat pocket and grabbed my pass. I took it out and handed it to the lady. "Thank you."

"No, thank you," I replied cheesily but honestly as I stepped around her and continuing down the fairly empty corridor. I found the door that led to the prop room and and pushed it open. The loud chatter hit me as soon as I entered, and I frowned. The room monitors would not like that. They were always yelling at us to shut up.

"Hey," one of the girls in my group, Lily, greeted me as I walked up and set my bag down.

"Hey," I replied as I took my coat off, revealing my Sugar Plum costume, which I was surprisingly still able to fit in to after all the food Flo had stuffed into me so I could 'stay energized'.

"What's up?"

"Mm, not much. Had a party in town last night, and I had fun at the karaoke," I responded, looking around at all the other excited and/or nervous dancers. I was a bit nervous myself, like I always am before a show, but I was more excited.

"Oh, lucky. Wish I could have come. Isn't it such a bummer that the dance was canceled?" Lily pouted. "I had a great outfit planned..."

"Yeah, my friend Shannon was upset about it because she was actually going with someone for the first time, so some of my other friends and I organized a little party with the townsfolk to cheer her up," I said as I smoothed and perfected my tutu.

"Aw, that's so sweet of you guys," Lily smiled at me, and I smiled back. "Wish I have friends that would do that for me."

"I bet your friends would," I said, trying to think of something else to say. "I guess the proper situation to do something like that just never came up, which is a good thing, right?"

Lily shrugged. "Guess so."

"Girls, please quiet down, they're starting the show!" one of the room monitors called. Everyone shut up for about five seconds before resuming their conversations in a slightly lower tone that before. I rolled my eyes at them and lowered my voice to a whisper.

"So what are you doing for Christmas?" I asked Lily as I sat on top of a table and started putting my pointe shoes on. The prop room was obviously full of props from the school's plays. I could see some things from last year's play, "_The Little Mermaid_", and the props they were collecting for this years play of "_Once Upon A Mattress_". Some of the popular girls in my class were crashing on some of the mismatched mattresses by the door that led backstage. There was an eight-foot-wide path between the two doors on either side of the room that was filled with dancers and bags and costumes, but everywhere else in the room, which must have been the size of my house, was cluttered up with props.

"My family is heading to my grandparents on Monday, and we'll stay there until after Christmas," Lily informed me as we watched in slight glee as the girls on the mattresses got yelled at by the monitors. Neither of us liked those girls - they always talked through class, when we were supposed to be dancing, and were solely responsible for the fifty sit-ups we had to do when we stretched because of how much they talked. Also, they thought they were superior to everyone else in the class, especially 'weird' little old me.

"That sounds fun, I'm just staying home and wishing for snow," I replied as I checked that my ribbons were wrapped around my ankles properly and got off the table and started warming up. Lily shrugged.

"Eh, not really. Yours sounds a lot cooler."

"Well, at least your grandparents _want_ you," I said somewhat bitterly, pulling the '_I'm an orphan, be nice to me and agree to every thing I say_' card. Lily just looked confused.

"What?"

Oooh, right, I never told Lily how I came to be with Doc... She knew I was adopted, but not why. I explained how when my parents died my grandparents handed me over to the orphanage. Lily looked horrified. "Oh, I'm so sorry! I guess I really shouldn't be complaining. My grandparents aren't very entertaining, but at least they love me. Er, not to say that yours don't, just... Argh..."

"It's fine, they aren't my grandparents. At least I don't consider them to be," I said, trying not to smirk as my brilliant plan worked.

Lily and I exchanged small talk until it was announced that the Sugar Plum fairies had to line up. I stopped warming up, smoothed my tutu again, and straightened my headpiece. The headpiece was a silver sort of tiara that I had to bobby pin into my thick hair with about a billion pins. It was pretty, but brutal - the dumb thing kept digging into my skull.

I took my place in our line, the order based on how we would enter the stage. I was behind Brianna (one of the popular girls) and in front of Elle.

"Oh, look, hillbilly Kelly showed up from her ghost town," Brianna smirked. I rolled my eyes.

"Oh, go crawl back into the hole you came from, Hobbit-face." Oh, why did I say that? That's an insult to the Hobbit!

Elle, also one of Brianna's victims, sniggered from behind me. Brianna glared at her, and she shut up. Then, she turned her wrath back to me. "Stop trying to act all cool and funny, little orphan Annie," she sneered, her hazel eyes glittering maliciously. How she knew I was an orphan I wasn't sure - it wasn't a common fact I shared with my class that I was adopted. Possibly she had overheard my conversation with Lily. "No one wants you - not even your own family. Oh, wait a second - you don't have a family!"

"Doc's my family, and obviously he wants me, otherwise I'd be in Pennsylvania and not here. Maybe that'd be a good thing, though. The farther I am from you, the better."

Our argument might have gone on longer, but then the monitors rushed us backstage, where we had to be quiet or else. I took advantage of the dark and made a rude hand gesture at Brianna's back.

We watched quietly as the Angels performed their routine. Their long, flowy white costumes were gorgeous, but I didn't care for the wings. Instead of feathers, they bore rhinestones, and I didn't like that parting from tradition for whatever reason. The costumes here get crazier and crazier... You should just see Mother Ginger. She looks like she may be related to Lady Gaga.

The Angels struck their ending poses, and the curtains closed to loud applause. Us Sugar Plum Fairies hurried onto the stage to our starting positions.

"_Bum, bum. Bum, bum. Bum..._"

I looked up as the music cued me, smiling. I nearly had to squint through the bright lights, but I refrained from doing that. I rose up as more instruments joined the song and started with the _echappes_. I remembered the rehearsal on Wednesday, when I had told Doc I didn't think I had pointed my toes enough. I instantly pointed my feet all the harder as I started to _bourree_ into the triangle.

Halfway through the dance, my smile flicked as pain shot up my left foot. My toe! I hadn't put enough lamb's wool on my toes, and now the skin on one of them had rubbed off. Ugh, I hate when that happens. It's just a small bit of skin that's rubbed off, about half the size of a dime, but it hurts so bad. In class when this happened, we were allowed to stop and go get a band-aid to nurse the broken skin with, but I obviously couldn't do that here. Ugh, I thought that my toes had callused enough so that this wouldn't happen any more. I know that sounds kind of gross, but obviously having toughened skin helps keep my toes from getting wounded.

I spent the rest of the dance trying to hide the pain behind my smile as it increased. I was dreading the double pirouette, which is when a dancer turns twice on one foot, and in this case, that foot was my left. But there was nothing I could do...

_Five, six, seven..._ My class and I prepped for the pirouette. _Eight_.

I pushed up onto my left foot and gave a small yelp as I spun around. "_Oh, crap_," I thought as I got around once. I wasn't going to be able to get around twice. I forced myself to at least try, but I had to get down halfway through my second turn. Thankfully, our landing position was one where we put our right feet behind us and lifted our left arm horizontal to our body and our right arm up almost vertical to our body, but not quite, creating a 120 degree angle with our arms, so I was able to stick my leg out behind me and whip myself around to the right position.

There were only two eight counts left in the dance... One and a half... Ow... One... Half... OW... I rose up in fifth position as my arms struck the fourth position, smiling like my toe wasn't on fire. The crowd went wild (everyone loves the Sugar Plum fairies) as the lights dimmed and the curtains closed. I relaxed and came down from my tip toes, then limped offstage, mentally cursing myself for not putting more lamb's wool in. I apparently wasn't the only one that had made that mistake, because Ashley and Brianna were also walking lightly on their right feet. I hobbled into the prop room as the Spanish dance, also called Coffee for reasons unknown the me, started. I loved that song. It was a pretty and somewhat upbeat one, at least for, you know, one hundred plus year old music.

I sat down on the table, groaning. "What happened? Did you get hurt?" Lily asked me, concerned, as I nearly ripped my left pointe shoe off to inspect the damage caused by the rubbing. I noticed that there was a bit of red on the inside of my toe pad, and some more on the bit of white tight near my fourth toe. Not a good sign.

"Yeah, some of the skin on my fourth toe, I think it was, rubbed off," I explained as I gently lifted my tights over my feet. I had convertible tights, meaning there was a hole on the bottom on the tights so I could lift the tights over my feet and take a look at them without having to take the tights off entirely, meaning I would have had to basically strip in the middle of the prop room, since my tights were on under my flash leotard, which was under my costume.

Sure enough, the skin on my fourth toe had rubbed off a bit, and was now bleeding slightly. I scowled - in the rare case where the skin on my toe rubbed off, I was able to take a break from my class and put a band-aid on it before it would start bleeding, but not today. I would have to replace my toe pad, since you can't wash those. I grabbed a band-aid from the box inside my pointe shoe bag, unwrapped it, and placed it around my toe.

"You okay? Need any Neosporin?" Lily asked as she cooled down her own feet by practicing some simple exercises. I nodded.

"No, thanks. Neosporin weakens the skin or something so it breaks easier again. But I'm fine. Nothing major happened. " I put my shoe back on - I still had to cool down, warm back up thirty minutes later before the finale, and then do the actual final - and joined Lily in cooling down. I stood in second position and pushed over in a demi-pointe on my right foot, held it for eight counts, then pushed up into pointe. I did the same, but more gently, with my left. I repeated the exercise a few more times, then crashed on the table. "Urgh. I'm tired."

"Why are teenagers always tired?" Lily mused as she sat down next to me.

"Cause I was up late last night partying, and then I felt guilty about not practicing, so I practiced for half an hour before Doc started scolding me and told me to get to sleep, then Sarge and Fillmore woke me up at six, I feel back asleep until nine, and now I'm tired from dancing," I moaned.

"What time did you get to sleep at?"

"Twelve ten or so."

"No offense, but that wasn't a very smart thing to do on the night before a show."

"Yeah, I know. I was tired, I wasn't thinking straight."

"Try to get to sleep earlier, tonight, okay?"

"Who are you, my mother?"

"No, just a friend concerned for your personal welfare."

"Thanks."

...

Lily and I warmed up as the Arabian dance, the fourth from last dance, started. We lined up with the rest of our class during the Love Theme, then headed backstage as Kaitlyn, the blonde who played young Clara, started the Clara Awakens dance. They moved onto the final dance, Clara in the Mirror, and I watched dreamily as Kaitlyn performed with Jenna, the girl who played older Clara. I hoped someday I could play Clara... Oh, that'd be awesome.

I was jerked out of my fantasies as the finale music started. During the finale, each class walked onstage, did a quick eight count dance, often a memorable move or two from their dance, bowed, and walked backwards to allow the next class to go. The Angels went, and then it was my class's turn. I smiled broadly at the applauding crowd as we ballet ran onstage for eight counts, did two _echappes_ and a _sous-sous_ turn, bowed, and walked backwards until we almost ran into the Angels. The Spanish dancers went next, then the Chinese doll, and so forth. Finally, Clara danced onstage with her Nutcracker prince and performed a small dance with each other. Then, everyone lifted their hands up and did the biggest bow they could without whacking their faces in someone's tutu or butt, straightened, and blew a kiss to the crowd as the music came to a close and the curtains fell. I found the kiss thing cheesey, but the audience loved it.

One by one, each class left and headed back to the prop room or the corridor outside the stage, where some of the dancers with bigger roles, such as Clara, or were in many dances would put their stuff. I sat back on the table with my bag on it, grinning happily. Despite the injuries that I sometimes got, I loved performing. I took my shoes off and stuffed them back inside my bag, not bothering to cool down. The finale hadn't been all that much work for my feet, minus that particular toe, which was still aching a bit, but better from it's break between the Sugar Plum Fairies and the finale dances. I pulled my tan Ugg boots on (that names cracks me up, but they're cute boots) and wriggled into my purple coat.

"See you tomorrow," I told Lily. We had another performance tomorrow, at one. She waved to me as she hopped around, trying to get her own boots on.

"See - ACK! - you!" she said as she nearly toppled over. I giggled and walked out into the corridor, which was packed with dancers wanting to get home. I grabbed my iPhone from my bag (technically, we weren't allowed to have electronics backstage and such, because people might take pictures of other people who were changing, but I wasn't going to use it for taking pictures, I just liked having it with me) and checked the time. Eight thirty. The show had started at seven, and I was ready to get home.

I fought my way into the lobby and looked around for Doc. Instead, I saw Lightning. My eyes widened. Lighting had been watching? I saw someone else standing right by him, but I couldn't really make them out in the crowd. However, it looked like a blonde... Sally?

I pushed my way towards them, and my mouth fell open in shock when I realized that not only had Doc, Lightning, and Sally been there, but so had Shannon, Andrea, Flo, Ramone, Mater, Ms. Harper, Siddeley, Holley, and Finn! My hand flew to my open mouth as they practically mobbed me, congratulating me on my 'spectacular' performance.

"Oh my gosh, why - since when were all of you guys coming? Not that I'm ungrateful, but.. Oh my gosh..." I blushed at how flustered I was, and Sally gave me a squeeze.

"We wanted to see you dance, silly! But we didn't want to put too much pressure on you, so we didn't tell you we were coming," she informed me. I hugged her.

"That's so sweet of you guys," I said, smiling broadly.

"You done did good up dere, Miss Kelly," Mater said, also grinning.

"Thanks, Mater," I smiled at the tow truck driver as someone tapped me on the shoulder. I turned to see Doc, who presented me with one of those white roses that had been for sale at the box office. "Aw, thanks, Doc."

I hugged my guardian, and he hugged me back. "You're very welcome. You deserved it, you did really well up there."

"Thanks," I said again.

"How about we get out of this cramped lobby and go back home? We can celebrate at my cafe," Flo suggested in her booming voice. Everyone looked at me for confirmation.

"Sounds great," I said happily.

"Well, then, what are we waiting for?" Flo turned around and led our huge pack to the door. We dispersed and headed to our own cars. My toe started to hurt again, but I forced myself to walk normally, in order to not have someone question me and me replying with an answer that would kill the cheerful mood. As I opened the door to Doc's car, I noticed a star shining brightly in the sky. I considered making a wish, but really, there wasn't anything I could wish for. I already had it all.

Doc and I drove back home, following Mater, Holley, Finn, and Siddeley in Mater's truck, chatting about random stuff, mainly the show. I didn't tell Doc about my toe, but I figured he'd find out at one point or another.

Twenty-five minutes later, after I had quickly changed, everyone was at Flo's, sipping hot chocolate, stuffing their faces with the last of the cookies from Wednesday, and talking, joking, and laughing. Shannon, Andrea, and I had a booth all to ourselves, where we were chatting in comfort, when Lightning came up to us. "Hey, you wanna join us?" he asked, pointing to the huge table in the middle of the cafe. "We pushed some tables together so everyone could sit at one."

Without hesitation, Shannon, Andrea, and I picked up our hot chocolate and made our way over to the huge table. I was reminded slightly of the tables from the Great Hall in Harry Potter as I sat next to Holley. I looked up and down the table at the happy people, and remembered Brianna's taunt from earlier. _"No one wants you - not even your own family. Oh, wait a second - you don't have a family!" _

Brianna was wrong. Blood doesn't make a family - love does. I love these people. They were all my family, and I couldn't ask for a better one.

...

Hope you guys liked this chapter! Wish I were Kelly... I have my own performance of T_he Nutcracker_ tomorrow, and I'm just a Candy Cane. Oh, well, our dance is cool, and our costumes are adorable, so I'm good for now.

Please review! Thanks for reading!

Kitty


	8. Chapter 8: Day Eight

**Sunday, December 21, 2014 - Four Days Until Christmas**

...

I walked into Doc's and my kitchen at nine the next morning, yawning as I opened the fridge.

"G'morning," Doc greeted me.

"M-m-morning," I yawned back sleepily as I poured myself a glass of milk and started drinking it as I put the almost empty carton of milk back the fridge, nearly choking on my milk as I yawned while drinking it. I gagged and set the glass down.

"You okay?" Doc asked, looking at me from over his paper.

"Mmm-hmm, just having trouble waking up. Or at least I was, until I choked on my dumb milk," I replied as I coughed, trying to get the last of it down. It worked, and I moved onto making some toast.

"Ah, I see. It was the milk's fault you choked, not your own clumsiness."

"I never blamed it on the milk, and I'm not clumsy! Well, not very..."

"I'm just kidding, lighten up," Doc chuckled. I stared.

"Did you," I asked slowly as I pointed at Doc, "just tell _me_," I pointed at myself, "to lighten up?" No offense to Doc, but he wasn't always the, ah, most... Light... Sugarcoating is working. Doc can be a grump, end of story. Me, on the other hand, I'm not usually very grouchy (unless I've been deprived of chocolate for longer than twelve hours) - I'm quite perky and 'lightened up'.

Doc nodded, smirking. "Well, I never!" I clamped a hand over my mouth. "Oh... I'm going nuts now, I need chocolate..."

I turned away for the toaster and headed for the cabinet where Doc and I kept our chocolate. "Uh-uh. Not this early in the morning, before you've eaten anything healthy," Doc rebuked me, and I sighed, turning back to my now burning toast. Stupid doctor instinct thingies...

...

"Mrrrrrrrreeeeeeeeaaaaaaahhhhhhhhaaackk."

"What are you doing?"

"I'm bored, so I'm making weird noises."

"Oh."

Silence.

"MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. MOOOOOOOOOOOO. We're all cattle."

"WHAT?"

Andre stared at me after I mooed. I was lying my back on my bed, staring at the ceiling. Andrea was sitting on my desk chair, and Shannon was just lying on the floor. "I dunno."

Andrea rolled her eyes. "And they call me weird," she muttered. I glared at her.

"Let's go bug Lightning," Shannon suggested. I sat up, frowning.

"I don't know, that seems a little rude," I protested. Shannon looked at me, the eyebrow that wasn't hidden by her hair raised.

"Do you have any better ideas?"

"...Let's go."

Shannon, Andrea, and I walked through the house silently, having nothing to say. I had just gotten home from my second and final Nutcracker show, and was now free to do whatever I liked for over a week, until stupid school started back up. Needless to say, I was putting my free time to good use by complaining about how there was nothing to do. Had Doc not been at another kid's check-up, he would have lectured me on all the possible things I could have done, but he wasn't, so hallelujah.

We trudged towards the race stadium, and I yawned. Next to me, Shannon yawned, then Andrea, then back to me. "Why are we all y-y-yaaaawning?" I yawned.

"I heard that yawns are contagiooooooous," Andrea yawned.

"That's annoying," Shannon started to yawn again, but clamped her hands over her mouth. "I wefuse to wawn," she said, her voice muffled through her hands. Of course, she yawned. "DANG IT!"

Andrea and I laughed as we entered the racing stadium. Andrea looked around excitedly - her dream was to become a NASCAR racer like Lightning. She couldn't drive a regular car, but she could drive a race car, no problem (Lightning had taught her, but don't tell Sheriff - I don't think that a fourteen year old girl driving a race car is legal). We made our way to Lightning's office, and I had to practically drag Andrea, who wanted to look at all the pictures of famous NASCAR racers and such.

"Hey," I greeted Lightning as we barged into his office. He looked up from his laptop.

"Oh, hey," he greeted us. "What's up?"

"We're bored. Entertain us," Shannon said as she settled into the chair across from Lightning on the other side of his desk. He raised an eyebrow at her haughtiness.

"Excuse yourself?"

Shannon sighed. "Could you please do something fun with us, O Great One?"

Lightning snickered. "That's more like it. Sorry, but I'm busy. Go play in the snow or something."

"There is no snow, genius," I said, rolling my eyes.

"Ohhh... Then let's make some!" he exclaimed as he jumped up from his chair, shutting the lid of his laptop.

"I thought you were busy," I said skeptically, raising an eyebrow as I stepped back to let Lightning get to the door. He shrugged.

"Eh, it's just stupid paperwork, I can do it tomorrow," he said casually. "Now come on, do you want snow or not?"

Shannon hopped out of the chair and trotted after Lightning. I looked at Andrea, and she shrugged. We followed Lightning and Shannon onto the race track outside.

"Sooo, how are we supposed to make it snow? Yell at the sky? Bribe the weather? Beat up Jack Frost?" I asked Lightning as we walked along the race course. He snorted.

"Of course not. We'll use a snow-making machine, like the ones they use at skiing places during the winter when there isn't actually all that much snow. We have one somewhere around here. Be right back." With that, Lightning turned around and ran right back inside. I rolled my eyes and walked over to the wall and slid down it to a sitting position. I looked around the race track, smiling a bit as I remembered happy times that had taken place here. Once last summer, Shannon, Andrea, and I had held a race of our own here. Since none of us could drive, we used skateboards, and since none us us could skateboard, we just lay flat on our tummies on the skateboards and pulled ourselves along by our arms. It had taken us about fifteen minutes just to get around the stadium once, but it had been fun.

I remembered another time when Doc had been sick when Lightning had had a race. Since Doc couldn't be his pit crew chief, I volunteered. I could tell that at first Lightning had been wary of having a teenage girl being his pit crew chief, but those doubts disappeared two hours later, when he had won the race. That had been one of the proudest days on my life...

I steered off Memory Lane when Lightning pushed through a door, heaving a huge machine along with him. "A little help, please?" he huffed. I jumped up and Andrea, Shannon, and I ran over to assist the race car driver. Together, we were able to pull it to the center of the stadium.

"Yikes," I panted as I nearly collapsed on the ground, sweating despite the forty degrees weather. "So, this is the all-powerful snow maker?"

"Yup," Lightning said happily, patting it. "It is."

"So how does it work?" Shannon asked as she inspected the machine somewhat doubtfully. Despite it's obnoxious weight, the machine didn't look like much. It just looked like... Junk.

"Hmm... I dunno," Lightning admitted, looking a bit embarrassed. Andrea sniggered.

"Do you have an instruction manual?" I asked him, smirking. Lightning snorted.

"Seriously? An instruction manual? You think I have have to use an instruction manual? No one ever uses the instruction manual these days! Instruction manuals are for losers! Instruction manuals are for losers who are too dumb to put something together! I don't have to use an instruction manual! I - "

"You lost it, didn't you?" I said, interrupting Lightning's rant.

"Erm... You could say that."

I sighed. "Guess we'll just have to wing it." I pressed a random button, and the National Anthem started to play. My eyes widened. "Ooookaaaay..." I tried another, and the patriotic song was replaced by Thriftshop... The not clean version. "Oh, geez." Shannon hastily pressed another button, and the music stopped as multi-colored confetti can flying out of the little cone protruding from the side of the metal machine, from which I guess the fake snow was suppose to come out of. Lightning tried switching a switch, and we were rewarded with the confetti being replaced by fire.

"HOLY CRAP!" I shrieked as I jumped away in order to keep my butt from being set aflame. Andrea hit the side of the machine, and the entire thing burst into flames. Shannon yelled and she and Lightning ran to get some water as I ripped Andrea's coat off and threw it on the ground, trying to stomp out the fire. Lightning and Shannon ran back with a bucket with water sloshing around in it, and they dumped it on the flaming machine.

Instantly, the machine exploded. We all went flying backwards, and I landed painfully on my side. I barely had time to yelp before something wet and sort of fluffy hit me, but I guess it was too dense to be classified as 'fluffy'. Did I mention that it was very cold? If it hadn't been for the cold, wet stuff that made it's way in my clothes and caused me to jump up, squealing shrilly, I probably would have been buried under it.

I did a little dance as I tried to get the stuff our from underneath my shirt. After a minute, it was gone, and I looked around at the race stadium. I was too shocked to gasp - it was completely covered in snow! So that snow machine had worked!

"It worked!" I whooped as Lightning, gasping, emerged from a large snow pile. "Dude! It worked!"

"I noticed," he gasped as across the stadium, Shannon also popped out of the snow, with a little pile of the stuff on her head. She looked around wildly.

"Woah..." she murmured, then she froze. "Oh, dang, where's Andrea?!"

"Oh my gosh!" I gasped, looking around in a panic. "She must be buried under all the snow! What if she's suffocating? I bet she's suffocating! Quick, you guys, we have to find here! Where could she be?"

I tried to run through the snow to try to find Andrea as I heard an annoyed voice call, "I'm up here, genius!"

I looked up in shock. Andrea was sitting casually on top of a stadium lamp post, about twenty feet up in the air. My mouth fell open. "How'd you get up there?"

"Got blown up here by the explosion," she said, shuddering. "Now the important question here is HOW THE HECK AM I GOING TO GET DOWN?!"

Lightning got up, still staring at Andrea as he brushed his red coat off. "Here, just a sec," he said, and he trudged through the snow towards the lamp post, which was a tricky job, considering the snow was two feet deep. I followed him, also having to fight through the snow. Once we got there, Lightning held out his arms. "Jump."

"What? Are you _insane?_"

"I'll catch you!"

"Sure you will."

"I will, I promise!"

"It's not that I don;t trust you, Lightning, I just... Don't... Trust... You..."

"Well, do you have any other ideas on how to get down?" Lightning yelled back up to her. I think Andrea sighed, but I didn't know for sure because she was so high up.

"Fine, but if you don't catch me and I die, I swear I'll kill you," Andrea shouted, and then she jumped.

"I've got you, I've got you," Lightning exclaimed as he ran around trying to catch her. "I've got - OOF!"

Lightning went down face-first into the snow as Andrea landed on his back. Andrea, who was completely unharmed, casually rolled off his back, grinning. "That was fun! Let's do it again!"

Lightning groaned and pulled his face out of the snow. "Let's not," he disagreed as he slowly picked himself up, cracking his back. "Good Lord, Andrea, how much do you weigh?"

Andrea smacked him, and he went flying back into the snow. "I was joking, I was joking!"

I laughed as the door opened again and someone cried, "What _happened_ in here?" I stopped laughing as everyone turned to look at Sally, who was staring at us in disbelief.

"Erm... A Christmas miracle?" Shannon suggested, picking up a bit of snow and throwing it in the air, like that would make her theory more believable. Sally slowly walked into the stadium, stumbling a bit through the snow. Lightning got back up and brushed himself off before he went to help his girlfriend.

"What happened in here?" Sally repeated, looking at the snow-covered stadium in shock.

"Um... Well, it started when the girls got bored - " Lightning began, but Sally interrupted.

"Okay, that's enough for me. I can see where that went. Now I want to know... How good of a snowball can this stuff make?" With than, Sally bent down, scooped up some snow, and formed it into a ball. She tossed it up and down in her hand a bit, looking satisfied. "Anyone up for a snowball fight?"

I grabbed some snow myself and packed it into a ball. "I am," I declared. My answer was a snowball in the face. "Sally!"

"That was Shannon!" Sally said, pointing her now empty hand at Shannon, who looked flabbergasted.

"Whaaaat?"

I smirked as I whipped the snow off my face and threw my own ball at Sally, who dodged. It ended up hitting Lightning in the face. "Oh, gosh, sorry, Light..."

Lightning whipped the snow of his face and looked at me solemnly. "I now declare this WAR!"

"Shannon, Andrea!" I yelled, and my two best friends rushed to my aid. We grabbed some snow, as did Sally and Lightning, who were their own obvious team, did the same. I threw my snowball, aiming for Sally's shoulder, but it just barely missed and instead hit Lightning's chest. Before I knew it, the air was filled with laughter, shouts, and snowballs - I could barely see through the snowballs flying left and right. I ducked and dodged snowballs, but still got hit with a fair few. However, I think I hit my targets more than they hit me.

Five minutes later, the door suddenly opened again, and the laughter and snowballs died down as Doc entered the racing stadium, looking stunned. He looked at me. I was frozen in my pitcher-like position to throw a snowball, with one arm in the air with a snowball in hand. Then he looked at Lightning, who had a huge snowball that he was about to dump on Shannon's head in his hands. He tried to hide it behind his back as he greeted Doc, with obvious unsuccessful.

"You have got a lot of explaining to do."

...

Long story short, we had to clean up the stadium. The bad news was it took up the rest of the day. The good news was that when Lightning got tired, I was allowed the drive the snowplow we were using. It was awesome.

Around seven o'clock, I trudged home and collapsed on the couch, groaning. Doc walked in the door behind me, looking amused. He sat down on the couch, and I moved my feet so he wouldn't sit on them.

"So, I never did find out... How exactly did the stadium get covered in fake snow?"

"Um... It's a long story."

...

I got the "MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. MOOOOOOOOOOOO. We're all cattle." idea from the beginning of the chapter from my aunt's real story about how some guy standing behind my aunt at somewhere started randomly doing this the other day. It freaked my aunt out.

Anyway, I hope you guys all liked this chapter! Again, it wasn't edited, because it's too late for me to do so, so sorry for that. Hopefully tomorrow won't be so busy...

Reviews make my day. :3

Thanks for reading!

Kitty


	9. Chapter 9: Day Nine

**Monday, December 22, 2014 - Three Days Until Christmas**

...

"WILL YOU TURN THAT DISRESPECTFUL JUNK OFF?!"

"Respect the classics, man, it's "Deck the Halls!"

I growled as my eyes opened, and jumped out of bed, storming to the window. I unlocked it, threw it up, stuck my head outside, startling a sparrow on my window sill, and yelled, "RESPECT THE CLASSICS?! HOW ABOUT YOU RESPECT MY DECISION TO SLEEP IN AND SHUT UP!"

I shut my window before either of them could respond (I didn't suppose Sarge would be too happy about my outburst) and flopped back into my bed. A minute later, my door opened, and I'm guessing Doc stuck his head inside, but I couldn't see, as my face was buried in my pillow. "Was that you?"

"No, it was the Abominable Snowman," I replied sarcastically, my voice muffled from the pillow.

"How about next time, you respect their decision to bicker and just sleep with some ear muffs on?" Doc suggested, taking a sip from his morning coffee.

"Been there, done that. It don't work."

"It _doesn't_ work."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, you knew what I meant anyway."

Doc chuckled. "Oh, you amuse me."

"Isn't that why you adopted me? To become your own personal entertainment?"

"Yes, that's exactly why I adopted you." With that sarcastic remark, Doc exited my room, leaving only the tantalizing smell of his coffee. I sighed and flipped back over, trying to get back to sleep, but failing. After fifteen minutes, I just reached over, plucked my iPhone off it's iHome on my nightstand, and started playing Temple Run 2. After thirty minutes of this, I put my iPhone back on it's charger, and got up, stretching, before going to the bathroom to comb my hair and brush my teeth, then going to hunt down some breakfast.

...

"Annie, can you help me and Sam do something?" Grant asked Andrea. We were on her front porch step, gossiping, when the little Hussarya twin came sidling up to us with a cute little kid expression on his face.

"Sure, just stop calling me 'Annie'. Makes me feel... Weird," Andrea requested. Grant's cute expression melted off his face, replaced by a rather war-like one.

"Great. Okay, so here's the plan," Grant announced in a low voice, motioning for us to move closer to him. Shannon and I exchanged an amused glance and leaned in, along with Andrea. "This year, me and Sam want to actually see Santa Claus." Oooh, I know where this is going... I would have done the same thing when I was Grant's age, had I actually had a companion to carry out my plan with. "So, we are going to make a trap for him, but we're going to need help."

"Grant, I don't know if you should do this. I mean, do you want to end up on Santa's naughty list?" Andrea tried to convince him, but Grant was set on catching the big red dude.

"Me and Sam agreed the risk is worth it. We actually betted with Henry Collins about who would be able to catch the big guy."

"What? You placed money on it?"

"No, of course not! Whoever catches Santa gets the loser's presents."

"Now I really don't think this is a good idea."

"Chicken."

"Excuse yourself?" Andrea's mouth fell open incredulously.

"You're too chicken to try and catch Santa!" Grant mocked. Little devil...

"No, I'm not! I just don't think it's a good idea..."

"_Bock, bock, bock!_" Grant continued to mock his older sister by strutting around, flapping his arms like wings and making chicken noises.

"Stop it, you dork, I'm not chicken!"

"_Bock, bock, bock!_"

"Grant!"

"_Bock, bock, bock!_"

"Stop it! Seriously!"

"_BOCK, BOCK, BOCK!_"

"Fine!" Andrea shrieked as she jumped up, towering over her little brother, looking highly annoyed. "I'll help you with your stupid Santa trap!"

With that, Andrea stomped into the house. Grant, grinning, Shannon, looking amused, and I, grateful to be an only child, followed. "So, how are we going to catch Santa?" I asked Grant as I followed him up the stairs to his room.

"Shhh, I don't want anyone to hear us, we'll talk in my and Sam's room," Grant hissed as he clomped up the stairs and ran to his door. He whipped it open and slipped it, then shut it.

"Let's go," I said, grabbing Shannon's arm and turning around, but then Andrea, scolding Grant for leaving us outside, opened the door back in.

"Sorry," she apologized as I slunk into the room and sat on Sam's bed, which had a race car bedspread. Guess Andrea wasn't the only Hussarya with a passion for racing.

"It's fine."

"So," Sam announced, standing up. "Our mission: Catch Santa Claus."

"And what are we going to do when we catch him?" I asked him dryly.

"The pride from knowing we were the first kids in history to catch Santa Claus, of course! We'll get into all the history books - we'll be remembered forever as the kids that did the impossible and caught Santa!" Sam said, and I raised my eyebrows. When I die, I've always wanted to be remembered as a great dancer or singer, or both, not a kidnapper of children's joy-bringers.

"Oookay, so how are we going to kidnap Santa?" Shannon asked, looking mildly excited at the prospect of adventure. I'd think she would have had enough adventure and excitement after yesterday's snow fiasco, but guess not.

"I dunno, that's what he have to figure out," Grant said. "That's why we needed you."

I thought for a moment. "Well... Santa likes cookies, right?"

"Yeah..."

"How about we jeopardize his cookies?"

"Yeah! Then we could do somethin' to his milk, and then we could capture him!"

"How are we going to capture him?" Andrea asked, inspecting her nails, bored.

"How bout a net?" Grant suggested. Sam nodded, grinning.

"I like how you think! We'll set up a net that could be rigged so that when someone walks across it, it flies up, capturing them."

"And how will we do that?"

"How about we ask Holley and Finn?" Shannon suggested. Sam nodded, but I shook my head.

"Are you nuts? You want to enlist the help of two of the world's best secret agents to help us trap Santa Claus?"

...

**Five Minutes Later...**

"Holley, Finn, could I ask you a favor?"

Holley looked up from her book, and Finn from his computer. The two were at a booth in Flo's with Mater, who was already looking at me. "Sure, what is it?" Holley agreed.

"Erm... Are you busy?"

"No," Holley replied quickly before Finn could even open his mouth. "Finn's doing paperwork for C.H.R.O.M.E. and I'm pretending to help. We're free."

I laughed. "Alright, so, um... You know Andrea?"

"The girl with the blonde bob?" Finn asked, frowning as he tried to remember Andrea. I nodded, confirming his memory.

"Yeah. Well, her siblings wanna catch Santa Claus, and we need help making a trap..." I muttered. Holley laughed a bit and stood up.

"Sure."

"Wait, is you sure done sure we should be doin' dis?" Mater asked worriedly in his twangy Southern accent. I snorted.

"Yeah, their parents will make them take it down before anything bad happens," I assured him. Mater nodded and stood up.

"Sounds fun ta me."

"Wait, wait, wait. You want me to help to try and capture 'Santa Claus'?" Finn asked, incredulously.

"Oh, Finn, just come on! It'll be fun," Holley encouraged him.

"Why would you think that trying to kidnap someone is fun, Miss Shiftwell? Besides, I have paper work that needs to be done."

"You won't any paper work if I drench your computer in coffee," I threaten. Finn raised an eyebrow.

"Really? Did you just..." Finn started, but I snatched his computer.

"I did."

"Miss Hudson, give me that back."

My response was to run out the door, not sure whether I should be freaking out - I had just threaten a spy, what the heck was I thinking?! - or be giggling madly. I went with giggling nervously as I raced up the streets to the Hussaryas' home.

Suddenly, Mr. British Intelligence jumped in front of me, his grappling hooks in hand. I shrieked as he lunged for the computer and dodged him. However, he easily picked me up. "Alright, game over. Please give me my computer, Miss Hudson."

"How many times do I have to tell you? Just call me Kelly," I insisted, stalling for time.

"Fine, then. Please give me my computer back, Kelly," Finn said.

"No."

"No?"

"No."

"Alright... I didn't want to do this, but you leave me no choice..." Finn sighed, setting me back on my feet but not releasing me.

"Um... Finn? What are you going to do?" I asked nervously, hugging the laptop to my chest as I tried not to panic. He wouldn't hurt me, would he? Not for a dumb computer, right?

"It's time for the ultimate torture."

"Oh, s - HOLLEY!" I changed from my planned swear to screaming for help.

"Finn!" I heard Holley call as she started running up the street. "What are you - "

"TICKLE TIME!"

NOOOOOO - Wait, did Finn McMissile seriously just say TICKLE TIME? Good Lord...

Anyway, Finn started tickling me, and I shrieked. I hated being tickled. "Stop it, holy crap, what the heck? STOP IT! FINN! STOP, PLEASE, SERIOUSLY, OH MY GOSH, ARGH, STOP!" I shrieked. laughing. Finn was laughing - at least he wasn't mad. I know from personal experience that a mad Finn is a bad, bad thing.

"Holley, get the computer!" I yelled, in between shrieking laughs. Holley swooped in and grabbed the computer. "Get to the Hussaryas! Mater, show Holley to the - FINN! STOP! (he had tickled me in my most ticklish spot) - Hussaryas'!"

"Will do, Miss Kelly!" Mater shouted. Finn dropped me and ran after Holley and Mater, but I jumped on his back.

"Oh, no, you don't!"

Finn reached up and tried to pry me off, but I'm an expert on hanging on to things - it's a part of being an annoying little girl. Anyway, he was spinning in a circle as he tried to pry me off, and neither of us noticed the car in the street until -

HOOOOONK!

We both looked up, alarmed, at the car. The driver looked incredulous and annoyed at our actions. We made apologetic faces at him and moved our little fight to the sidewalk. Finn eventually got me off, but Holley and Mater were already inside the Hussarya's house. Finn and I made a dash for the door, and he just barely made it in before me. However, that gave me the opportunity to lock the door behind us.

When I looked away from the door, Finn had Holley in a headlock, Shannon was on Mater's shoulders holding the computer, Sam and Grant were handing onto Finn's legs, and Andrea was standing on the sidelines, looking flabbergasted.

"Miss Shiftwell, please, you really are too old for this immaturity! Please hand me my computer back," Finn almost pleaded. What, was he married to the thing?

"I'm not immature, and I don't have your stupid computer, dummy!" Holley retorted maturely. Finn rolled his eyes.

"Then where is it?"

"I'll never tell!"

Finn looked up and spotter Shannon, who grinned sheepishly. "Sup?"

...

Long, crazy story short, we finally got Finn to co-operate. Andrea went into the kitchen with Shannon to make some cookies meant to make Santa gag, reach for the hot chocolate with taco mixture in it, rush towards the sink, and get caught up in the net. Sam, grant, and I were helping the two spies and honorary spy make the net.

"So, do we have a net?" I asked the group, mainly the two twin boys. They nodded.

"Yeah, from our swing set," Grant said.

"I'll go get it," Sam volunteered, and he rushed towards the garage.

"Now how are we going to make it so that when someone steps on the net, it flies up, and where should we put it?" I asked Finn and Holley.

"That first part's easy. I had to do something similar in training, once. I just need two of those Slinkys, several meters of twine, and some nails," Finn said.

"I'll go get that!" Grant offered, and he ran off.

"I think we could maybe hang the trap in the hallway between the kitchen and the living room," I suggested. Finn nodded.

"Sounds good," he said, and we moved into the hallway I had mentioned and waited for the kids to return with the stuff. After a minute, they both raced into the hallway.

"Why'd you move?" Sam complained, dumping the dirty net at our feet.

"Sorry, I just decided this would be a great place to put the trap," I explained, and Sam nodded as Grant walked in with Finn's supplies.

"Why'd you move?"

"Sorry," I sighed, not bothering to explain as Finn accepted the supplies and started with the net. He started by tying the twine to all four corners of the net, and I watched as he attached the springs, then nailed the twine to the ceiling, and did something to rig the trap so once someone stepped on it, the net would be pulled up by the twine, trapping the victim inside.

By the time Finn was done, so were the cookies. The cookies had salt instead of sugar, and coffee beans instead of chocolate chips. Sam had voted to use rabbit droppings, but Andrea, Shannon, Grant, and I wouldn't allow that. Shannon had also prepared the taco hot chocolate,

"Well, save those for Christmas Eve," I told the boys, knowing that they would be gone by then, despite their weird flavor.

"Okay," they agreed as they snatched up the cookies and thermos with the 'hot chocolate' inside and ran off. Finn chuckled.

"Well, I've made you the trap, now please hand over my computer," Finn asked, holding out his hand. Andrea walked into the living room, reached under a couch cushion, retrieved Finn's computer, and handed it back to him. "Thank you."

With that, Finn walked out. Andrea turned to Holley, Mater, Shannon, and I. "Do you just want to go hang out in my room?"

Shannon and I agreed, but Holley and Mater had to go. We bid them good-bye and then headed up the stairs to start our gossip session.

However, the session was interrupted twenty minutes later by a yell, some pounding feet, a yelp, then another yell of "BOYS!" Andrea, Shannon, and I looked at each other, then went charging down the stairs, into the living room. We noticed the plate of salted coffee cookies and the half full cup of what looked like harmless hot chocolate, but had taco mix in it. We gasped and rushed into the hall to see Mr. Hussarya hanging in the net, glaring at his two sons.

"_Explain_."

...

Hey, guys! Hope you liked this chapter! Just barely published it before midnight... O.o How do I always get sidetracked from this until ten at night? Please excuse any mistakes, again, this chapter was not edited.

Anyways, reviews make my day!

Thanks for reading!

Kitty


	10. Chapter 10: Day Ten

**Tuesday, December 23, 2014 - Two Days Until Christmas**

...

Shannon, Andrea, Lightning, Sally, Doc, and I decided to go to see a Christmas movie that was playing in the small Jackson movie theater. We were seeing "_The Polar Express_", and though I wanted to skip that and see "_Mockingjay - Part One"_ again, Andrea wouldn't let me. She wanted me to see the Christmas because, after all, "It's Christmas!"

"What snacks do you guys want?" Lightning asked as we neared the concession stand.

"I'm good," I said, deciding to not mention I had a Kit Kat in my pocket. People weren't supposed to bring their own food into the theater, but that Kit Kat had been screaming my name when I left the house... "_Kelly! Kelly! Don't forget me! Eat me! Eat me!_"

Stop looking at me like that! And stop laughing! It's not polite to make fun of people.

Anyway, as I was saying, Lightning bought snacks (half of which I knew would be consumed by him), and we walked towards the theater the Polar Express was playing in. I stared wistfully at the "_Mockingjay- Part One"_ poster. Sure, I had already seen it twice, but still.

We entered the theaters as the commercials started playing. The first trailer was... I don't even want to know. The second, though, was a trailer for Insurgent, the second movie in the Divergent trilogy, which was another one of my favorite book/movie series. I started squealing quietly until Doc looked at me concernedly.

"Are you alright?" he asked, honestly worried. My face went red, and I cleared my throat as I shut up.

"I'm fine, just fangirling," I replied. Doc chuckled and sat back in his seat, looking back at the screen as one of the more violent parts, when Tris was trying to kill Eric.

"Woah, you want to see _this_ movie?" Doc asked me, flabbergasted. Somewhat sheepishly, I nodded. "Now why would you want to see this?"

"Because for the most part, it's really cool!" I protested quietly as, if on cue, that one Erudite nearly killed Peter. Doc just raised an eyebrow. I sighed and turned my attention back to the screen. "Let's discuss this later..."

We settled back in our seats, waiting for the Polar Express to start. After the Insurgent trailer, another trailer for a movie called "_Zombie Chickens Attack_" came on, and there was a scream of, "OMG, I love that movie!"

"Shhh!" Everyone turned to look at the squealer, a Goth-looking teenage girl in the back row.

"Shut up yourselves!" she retorted loudly. "I'm trying to watch this!"

I turned to Doc. "Now do you think my taste in movies are inappropriate?"

"I never said they were, just that that one doesn't look very appealing," Doc tried to explain himself. I rolled my eyes.

"Yeah, sure."

"I didn't once say that I disapprove of your taste in movies."

"You might as well have."

"I -"

"Shhh!" everyone in the theater shushed us. I hadn't realized that in my eagerness to defend me and my fandoms, I had been raising my voice. I blushed furiously.

"Sorry," I whispered, sinking down in my seat. Doc chuckled again. "It was half your fault, old man."

"Are you trying to get on the Naughty List?"

"Oh, shut up."

We made it through the rest of the commercials without any more disruptions, but it was after the movie started when the crazy picked back up. As the Polar Express came to pick up the kid - I don't know his name - is it even mentioned during the film? - some little boy behind me started kicking the back of my chair. After enduring a minute of this, I turned around and politely whispered, "Could you please stop doing that?"

"It wasn't me," the kid insisted, grinning. He must have been about five, and his mother was sitting right next to him, but she was too engrossed in the movie to notice my predicament.

"Well, whomever it was, tell them to please stop," I requested as I turned to face the screen again. Ten seconds, the kid was back at it, giggling in glee. I sighed and turned back as he withdrew his legs from the back of my chair. "Please stop that."

The kid shook his head, giggling loudly. Several people shushed him, but he paid them no attention. "Wasn't me."

I glared at him and turned away, hoping his mother would get a grip on him. Five seconds later, I was jolted in my seat by the force of the kid's kick. Jeez, he was annoyingly strong. I closed my eyes in frustration as he kicked my chair again. _Keep it together, Kelly, keep it together... _

BANG!

_"Heck with keeping together,_" I thought as I whipped around. "For the last time, _please_ stop doing that," I hissed.

"It wasn't me!" the kid giggled again. I glowered.

"If you do that again, you'll end up on Santa's naughty list._ Forever_."

The kid's eye grew as wide as saucers and he tucked his feet in. The mom, who had finally noticed, glared at me. I raised my eyebrows at her and turned back to find Doc giving me a disapproving look. "What? He lies, I lie. It's the circle of equality."

Before Doc could respond to my twisted philosophy, I settled back in my chair to relax and continue watching the movie. Now the kid was on the roof of the train with the ghost guy. I heard a slight rustling from behind me, but I ignored it. Big mistake. All of a sudden, I felt something pulling my hood back and something cold slid down my shirt. I yelped loudly and twisted around to see the kid getting back in his seat. I wildly groped around in my hoodie and grabbed something cold and hard that was melting fast. The kid had dropped an ice cube down my shirt! Why, that little -

"What know?" Doc groaned. I showed him the melting ice cube in my hand, and he looked surprised. "Where did that come from?"

"That kid from behind us," I said, gesturing to him by jerking me head in his direction, "dropped it down my shirt."

Doc's mouth fell open slightly, incredulous. "I'll have a talk with his mother after the movie," he assured me. I nodded and after tossing the ice cube on the ground (the theater had a carpeted floor, so no one would slip), settled back to try to watch the movie, but I was fuming at the nerve and rudeness of that kid. What, was he raised in a barn?

On the screen, the conductor was strapping the boy and girl down on the front of the train as they approached Glacier Gulch, speeding along dangerously fast. My mouth dropped open as the wild ride started. That... Looked... AWESOME! I love roller coasters. Once, last summer, I had been at a race with Lightning and Doc, and there was an amusement park near the racing stadium. After the race, Doc had taken me to the park for the rest of the afternoon. I had went on about six roller coasters, and had the time of my life. It could have been improved with the company of a few more of my friends, but it had been a fun father/daughter day for Doc and me. Or, well, me. I learned on the fourth ride with Doc that he was not at all fond of roller coasters.

"That looks awesome," Shannon whispered to me as the train zipped down the track, the three people on it's front screaming wildly.

"I know, right?" I said as someone pulled at my hair. "Ouch!"

"What is it?" Shannon hissed to me, not taking her eyes off the screen as I turned around to face the kid, clutching the area of hair he had just yanked. He shrugged, grinning, and I turned away.

"The little kid behind me is being super annoying. He dropped a stinkin' ice cube down my shirt."

Shannon tore her eyes away from the screen to stare at me in disbelief. "He what?"

"He dropped. An ice cube. Down. My. Shirt," I hissed from between my teeth.

"That's incredibly... Awkward. Rude. Weird."

"You're telling me."

I tried to watch the rest of the movie in peace, but I was on my guard for that kid. Throughout the course of the movie, up until the three kids in the movie got lost in Santa's Workshop (more like factory...), the kid poked me, pulled my hair, flicked popcorn and M&Ms at me, and blew on me. Yeah, he'd lean over and blow into my ear. His breath was annoying hot and smelled of... I don't even know what it was. Something unpleasant. The kid's mom seriously had to get a grip on him.

I finally sighed, struggling not to lose it as the kid poked me again, this time getting dangerously close to my ear. If that kid's sticky little finger got inside my ear, I was going to go insane.

"I'm moving," I informed Doc as I stood up, bending down as to not block other people's views, and walked around him to a seat two down from Doc's. Now that kid would never get to me. Finally... To celebrate, I reached into my pocket and brought out my Kit Kat, which I hadn't unwrapped yet, due to my distraction with that kid. The candy was slightly melted from my body heat, but I didn't care. It still tasted fine.

I was chomping down on the Kit Kat as the boy rang the bell by his ear and finally heard it. About time...

I heard a disturbance from behind me, and I growled. Was that kid seriously getting up just to annoy me? I heard his mother finally take some sort of notice of her kid. "Honey, what are you - "

The next thing I knew, something sticky, wet, and liquidy was being poured all over me! I shrieked as a few people gasped and the kid burst out laughing - he had dumped his mother's drink on me! EW, WAS THERE STRANGER SPIT IN THIS?

As Doc jumped up, giving an incredulous shout, I whipped the drink from my burning eyes and glared daggers at the grinning kid. "What the heck?" I shouted as my friends rushed to my aid.

"He was just trying to be funny!" his mother protested as she came and scooped up her devil child.

"Funny? How could anyone think that dumping Coke all over an innocent teenage girl is funny?" Sally protested, sounding like she couldn't believe that the lady was defending her naughty little kid.

"He's just five, he doesn't know any better!"

"He should! Did anyone in this theater not know when they were five that dumping stuff over a random stranger was rude?" Lightning called into the theater.

"No," a few people called back.

"Shut up!" someone else replied, throwing an empty popcorn box at us. It missed and hit the theater usher in the head as she came in the inspect the source of the noise.

"What's - Honey, what happened to you?" the lady asked, her mouth hanging open as she noticed me, dripping wet with Coke. For an answer, everyone in my party pointed at the little kid.

"My child accidentally spilled my Coke over this girl," the lady protested, but Doc interrupted.

"It wasn't accident, he's been tormenting her through the whole movie!" he protested, and the mother glared at him.

"My Joshua would never do that! He's the sweetest little boy ever invented," she cooed.

"Hey! My momma told me I was da sweetes wittle boy!" a young voice cried out indignantly amid chuckles.

"You are, honey, trust me," I called back, glaring at this 'Joshua'.

"Here, let's get you cleaned up," the usher said, turning around and heading out of the theater, obviously meaning for me to follow her. I flicked a bit of the Coke on my hand at that wretched Joshua and walked after the usher.

...

Back home that night, Doc and I, all cleaned up, sat on the couch and watched A Christmas Carol, all by ourselves with no Joshuas to interrupt.

"That was quite the movie experience," I commented to Doc, talking about our earlier attempt at watching a holiday movie.

"Yeah," Doc grunted. "I dunno how the heck that woman raised her child. At least I know now that I myself did a pretty good job."

I snorted. "You think you did all the work? No, I did all the work, you just paid the bills."

Doc laughed. "I disagree. You were a real hand full."

"But was I worth it?" I asked, half joking, half serious. I didn't want to have been a burden to Doc...

"Of course you were," Doc assured me, wrapping an arm around me.

"You sure?"

"Very."

"One hundred percent sure?"

"A hundred and ten percent."

"Are you positive?"

"What, do you want me to say that you were annoying?"

"No..."

"Then why are you questioning my answer?"

"I'm a troublemaker, that's why," I said, flipping my hair over my shoulder. Doc laughed as he agreed with me. We watched most of the rest of the movie in silence, until...

BANG!

Something knocked into the back of the sofa by where I was sitting. I yelped and jumped up, remembering Joshua. Doc started to roar with laughter as I figured out that it had only been Doc messing with me. "Doc! Not funny!" I laughed convincingly as I sat back down, playfully shoving Doc. He shoved me back, and we laughed before we finally settled back down to finish the movie.

...

FINALLY! I finished a chapter before eleven o'clock! :D :D :D Maybe I'll edit... But I'm tired, so I'll just do it tomorrow. Maybe.

ANYWAY, I also finally got to see Frozen today! Great movie... I noticed John Lasseter had something to do with it, although I can't remember what. I'm considering making a Frozen fanfiction. I'm also considering a Lab Rats one (funny story: I actually met the star of that show, Kelli Berglund, the girl I'm choosing to play Kelly in my imaginary Different movie). I get so many ideas... If only I had the time.

I hope you guys liked this filler chapter! Sorry that it was just that - a filler, but tomorrow's Christmas Eve, and there's bound to be a great chapter there! Can't believe it's already almost Christmas...

Reviews never fail to make me happy. :)

Thanks for reading!

Kitty


	11. Chapter 11: Day Eleven

**Wednesday, December 24, 2014 - One Day Until Christmas**

...

"HELP MEEEEEE!" I begged Lightning, sliding down to the ground, still holding his right leg. Thank the Lord he had a belt on, though, otherwise that would have gotten messy. Lightning snorted. I don't know if he was annoyed or amused - maybe a bit of both.

"Okay, first thing - Get off." I obliged. "Thank you. So, next thing. So what's you're saying is that it's Christmas Eve, but you haven't gotten Doc a present yet?"

I nodded, my face red as I stood up. "Yeah. I have the same darned problem every. Single. YEAR."

Lightning gave me a half grin. We were standing in his living room, and I had just came to him, begging for help. I had no idea what to get Doc for Christmas, despite that I had lived with him for about eight years, and now it was Christmas Eve. I was running out of time to get my guardian a present, and quickly. "So, first ask yourself - what does Doc like?"

"Racing... Books... Jennifer Lop -" I clamped my hands over my mouth. "Erm.. Chocolate. I meant chocolate."

Lightning looked disturbed at my slip-up. "Um, maybe you could bake him something, or buy him a book he wants..."

I snapped my fingers as an idea struck me. "Oh, I remember he said he that he wants this one book called "Killing Kennedy"."

"_Killing Kennedy?_"

"Yeah, weird, I know, but I can't think of anything else!"

"How about a book about the history of racing?"

"Maybe... I think he said that he wanted this one book called "Racing Through the Ages". Sounded pretty boring to men, but who knows what the heck runs through the minds of men. No offense."

"None taken," Lightning replied sarcastically. "Well, I've heard of that book. Sounds good, but I don't think it's a very popular one. We could check at a bookstore in Jackson for it, but I don't know if they'll have it."

I nodded in understanding. "Yeah, but I have to try. What else could I get him? I don't think there's enough time to make anything, even cookies, before the Christmas Eve party tonight, and then it's Christmas."

Lightning nodded and went for his car keys. Not the ones to his race car, sadly, the ones to his sweet Corvette. That was one heck of a car. It was red, like half of Lightning's things (I once politely asked him if he had some of disease that only the color red could cure - I got in trouble for that one), with a convertible top (so we could make like Britney Spears and stand up while driving, belting out that we wanted to go-o-o-o all the wa-a-ay) and normally had some of Luigi's whitewall tires, but Lightning had taken those off for the winter.

Twenty-five minutes later, we were in Jackson's main bookstore. I practically dove into a pile of random books, then proceeded to pretty much tear the store to pieces in search of "Racing Through the Ages". A few minutes later, someone tapped me on the shoulder.

"_What?_ Can't you - Oh, hi, Light," I switched from almost yelling my normal voice as I shoved a book back on it's shelf.

Lightning rolled his eyes. "Was this what you were looking for?" he asked, holding up a copy of "Racing Through the Ages".

"How'd you find it?" I gasped snatching it up and staring at it, almost not sure if it was real. Lightning smirked.

"I asked an employee if they knew where there was a copy of it, they said yes, brought it to me, voila, I had the book," he listed the steps, looking amused. I stared at him for a second, then facepalmed.

"Duh…"

"I'm a genius."

"No, I'm just stupid. Very, very stupid," I groaned, banging my head against the shelf, sending a cascade of down upon myself. "Example A."

"Well, you never fail to amuse me," Lightning assured me as a store employee came up to check on the disturbance. Together, we put the books back up. I bought the book, then Lightning and I walked out.

"Thanks for helping me out, Lightning. I really appreciate it," I thanked Lightning as we sat down in his car.

"It's no problem. Glad I could help." Lightning paused as he started up the engine. "Um.. Now could you help me?"

I looked at him in curiosity. What could I possibly help Lightning with? "Sure, with what?"

Lightning looked hesitant to tell me, like he was embarrassed about something. "I, well, I have no idea what the heck to get Sally," he mumbled, looking straight ahead.

"Oooooh."

"Yeah… I've been with her for a year, and known her for a year and a half, but I have no idea what the heck to get her! What kind of a boyfriend am I?"

"The kind that drives through red lights," I answered dryly as a clearly distracted Lightning drove straight through a red light. I was glad there weren't any cops around to see that.

"Oh, da - dang," Lightning decided mid-word not to swear, and I chuckled at him. Like I wasn't already contaminated by the idiots at school. When I told Lightning that it was okay for him to swear, he let off a long stream of rude words that would have left the boys at school gaping.

"Woah, woah, woah, dude, _language!_"

"You just told me I could swear!"

"Not that much!"

"Then how much?"

"Are we really having this conversation? On Christmas Eve?"

"Just help me come up with a good present for Sally, please?"

"Okay, okay. So, um… Sally likes… You… Radiator Springs… Law…."

"You're not any help," Lightning muttered darkly. I rolled my eyes as we turned a corner.

"Sorry, sorry, just brainstorming. She likes books…" I continued to muse out loud.

"Nah, I don't want to go back to the bookstore after your little accident."

"Jeez… She likes dogs."

"I can't get her a puppy on this short notice."

"She likes Harry Potter, and The Avengers."

"Merchandise just isn't right." I groaned as Lightning rejected this possibility. Picky, picky…

"How about jewelry?" I suggested as a last resort.

"That's it!" Lightning cried, nearly swerving off the road. "I can get her some earrings, or a necklace."

"Yeah, if you don't crash us first!" I exclaimed, holding onto the sides of my chair. "And they let you drive a race car?"

Lightning grinned. "Thanks."

I sighed as Lightning straightened out, only to turn back around and head back into Jackson to find Sally a piece of jewelry. "No problem."

...

By five, Lightning and I were all set. I had wrapped my book for Doc and put it under the tree, along with some cookies Flo and I had miraculously found time to back earlier that afternoon. Lightning had bought Sally a pretty emerald pendant necklace on a silver chain. The gem was surrounded by diamonds, and the color of the emerald matched Sally's eyes perfectly. I could tell that Lightning was excited about the gift.

"You ready to go, Kell?" Doc called from the front hall, where I imagined he was putting on his cobalt blue coat, the one that matched his Hudson Hornet.

I finished putting my hair into a high ponytail and checked to make sure I looked alright. I had on a cheery red knitted sweater with little snowflakes on it and some casual jeans, plus snowflake stud earrings. Since this was a special occasion, and I think we were expected to dress up more than I was, I put on some gold eyeshadow that no one would notice and some mascara that showed off my fairly long eyelashes. I decided the biting cold would be more effective than any blush, so I didn't bother with of that.

I walked into the front hallway, where I stuffed my feet in some fashionable black boots and put on my normal purple coat. "Okay, ready."

Doc nodded and opened the door, gesturing for me to go through first. I thanked him as I danced out into the chilly, brisk night. I looked in the mainly clear night sky, smiling at the stars. Doc and I walked side by side down to Flo's cafe, where the party was taking place. I saw Lightning walking down the street, clutching Sally's present tightly in one hand, and I waved, trying unsuccessfully to attract his attention. He walked on, remaining in his own little world, probably mentally going over on how he was going to present his gift to Sally.

We arrived at the party, which was starting to heat up. Flo, Mia, and Tia were serving holiday desserts and drinks, Sally and Holley were talking and sipping hot chocolate at a table, Shannon, Andrea and Hunter were getting down on the dance floor, Mater was forcing Finn off his computer, Ramone and Fillmore were trying to get Sarge to wear a Santa hat, and everyone else were just mingling. Some cheering Christmas music was playing over the speakers, manned by DJ, of course, and much to my surprise he was letting an overjoyed little girl wear his headphones and take her turn at the controls.

I went to join my friends on the dance floor. "Hey!"

"Hey, what's up?" Shannon asked me, grinning.

"Cute shirt," Andrea said as she danced around to "Deck the Rooftop".

"Thanks, Dree. Christmasy stuff, Shan. You?"

"Ditto!"

"Hey, just a warning - He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is here," Andrea warned. Shannon shrieked and jumped, looking around wildly in fear.

"He's here? He can't be! I mean, sure, maybe the Boogie Man and Santa are real, but he simply cannot be real!" she ranted, looking panicked.

Andrea and I shared a glance. Shannon had finally cracked. "Who are you talking about?" Hunter asked his unofficial girlfriend gently. She jumped to him and clutched his arm.

"You-Know-Who!"

"No, I don't know who."

"_Him_."

"Him who?"

"V-V-V-Voldemort! Andrea said He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is here!" Shannon squealed.

"I meant Aidan, dork!" Andrea said, smacking Shannon on the arm.

"Well, why didn't you just say so?" Shannon asked angrily. "You nearly gave me a panic attack!"

"Voldemort isn't real," I pointed out randomly, feeling my friend had to know this simple little fact.

"HE IS REAL!" Sheriff hollered from behind us. We all jumped and turned to look at the law-enforcer.

"No, he isn't!" Andrea protested. "He's a figment of J.K. Rowling's imagination."

"Or is he?" Sheriff suggested, glaring at Andrea. I rolled my eyes.

"And I'm out," I said, walking away from the crazed Sheriff and towards Sally and Holley, who had also been joined by Mater.

"Yello," I greeted them randomly.

"Hey, have you seen Sid?" Holley asked me, looking a bit worried. "Last I saw him, he was accepting some eggnog from Flo, and I think you can get what I'm hinting at."

I nodded in understandment. "Siddeley doesn't seem like the guy to get drunk, stumble into a cow field and wake up next morning with no recollection of the past twelve hours. At least not on eggnog." I looked around as Sally snorted at my comment. I spotted Siddeley flirting with a young woman as her angry boyfriend walked over and smacked Siddeley. Siddeley yelped and awkwardly apologized before fleeing. I snorted as he approached. "Forever single."

"Oh, merry Christmas to you, too," Siddeley said grumpily, rubbing his red cheek.

"How much eggnog did you get into?" Finn asked his friend sternly as Siddeley stood next to him.

"That scene wasn't because of the eggnog. I thought the eggnog was disgusting and donated it to a cactus a long time ago."

I nodded again. "Yeah, I don't like regular eggnog, either, but I love McDonald's eggnog shakes." My mouth watered just thinking about them. McDonald's eggnog shakes were the only food from that place that actually made me drool.

"You've had eggnog? Not with alcohol, right?" Finn asked for confirmation. I shook my head.

"Of course. I'm fourteen, I don't drink," I said in distaste. "And I have no plans to ever do such a thing."

"Good for you," Holley said approvingly. Mater shrugged.

"Ah drink some, but Ah'm fine," he said.

"Yeah, I know. I just don't want to do it," I replied. "So, what's everyone doing tomorrow?"

"Spending time with you guys," Sally said immediately. Holley nodded in agreement.

"Openin' presants, hangin' with y'all, da usual," Mater informed me.

"Same as everyone else," Finn said.

"Fighting killer rabbits." Everyone turned to Sid, looking at him weirdly. "I'm joking! Jeez, people, get a sense of humor. Especially you, Finn."

"Me? What's wrong with my sense of humor?"

"Or rather lack of," Siddeley replied haughtily.

"I don't have a lack of humor! I'm very humorous. I took a training course in it for C.H.R.O.M.E."

"Really?" I asked in awe. Finn nodded. "Sweet! What other schools offer that? Finally, something I have a guaranteed pass in."

"It's just for C.H.R.O.M.E.," Finn said as he accepted a cookie from Flo.

"AWWWWW."

"Well, you could become a C.H.R.O.M.E. agent," Finn said, and I could see what he was hinting at. Last summer, he had asked Mater and me if we had wanted to become permanent C.H.R.O.M.E. agents. We had both declined, much to his regret.

"Thanks, but I like my life here," I said politely. Finn nodded in understanding, still looking glum at my refusal. "But I'd be happy to help you whenever you need it. Unless it's Saturday. I don't work on Saturday."

Finn laughed. "Well, I'll keep that in mind."

I smiled at him as something cold and wet landed on neck. I gasped in shock and jumped, my hand flying to my neck to warm it. "What's wrong?" Sally asked, concerned.

"Something cold landed on me. Is it raining?" I complained, looking up into the now cloudy sky, but it didn't seem to be raining. "Hmmph."

"Hey, Kelly!" I heard someone call.

"Someone's calling for me. I'm gonna go see what they want. See ya," I told the others as I turned around on my heel and walked towards where I heard the voice. Suddenly, someone grabbed my hand and twirled me under the door.

"What the - Aidan!" I cried, already annoyed. "What was that for?"

"Look up," the devil suggested happily. I didn't even have to do that to know what I was standing under.

Mistletoe.

I had never hated the stuff so much.

"No! I am not kissing you!" I instantly protested, trying to back away, but Aidan grabbed me by the wrist and pulled me closer to him.

"Ah, but you can't leave until you do so. That's the rules," Aidan said, cheesily grabbing a bottle from his pocket and squirting some mouth freshener into his mouth.

"Rules were made to be broken."

"Not this one."

"Aidan, I am not, under any circumstances, kissing you! I'm sorry, but I just don't feel that way about you! Or anyone else, for that matter," I insisted. Aidan looked at me, smirking.

"Oh, come on, you know you'll love it," he teased. Oh, that was it! SMACK! I slapped Aidan. It wasn't too forceful, but it was enough to help me escape. I fled from the mistletoe, heading for Doc. He'd protect me, it's what dads do. They beat up the idiots who try and kiss their children.

"Help," I said simply as I reached him, hiding behind his back. Doc reached behind himself, grabbed my hands, and pulled me in front of him.

"What's going on?"

"Wait, let me guess," Lightning, who had been talking to Doc, interrupted. "Let me think… You burned your tongue drinking hot chocolate?"

"What? No."

"Okay. Yoooou…. Broke your ankle dancing!"

"Do I look like I'm in physical pain to you?"

"No... Hmm… Did you… Decide to take my car for a spin at the Butte, forget about the rough turn, go flying into the cacti patch, poke your eye out, and get needles up your butt?"

And they call me weird.

"Are you nuts? No!"

Doc rolled his eyes and opened his mouth as Lightning said,"Oh! I know! That Aidan kid caught you under the mistletoe and tried to kiss you!"

"_Yes!_ How'd you know?"

"I saw."

"Then why - " I started, but Doc interrupted.

"Why didn't you tell me?" he almost yelled. "No random boy's going to kiss my daughter under the mistletoe!"

See, I told you he wouldn't stand for it. And awww, he called me his daughter…

"Thank you!" I said in gratitude, gesturing at Doc. I glared at Lightning as I crossed my arms. "Next time you see me being attacked by Aidan, some help would be nice."

"Yeah, I considered helping you, but your reaction was so funny. I can't believe you slapped him!"

I glanced at Doc, who gave me a "_Well?_" look. I cleared my throat somewhat nervously, not wanting to get in the trouble I was surely about to land in.

"Erm… Well, I didn't want him to kiss me! I mean, come on, what was I supposed to do, just stand there and let the dork crush his on mine?" I defended myself, adding that "crush his lips on mine" part just to place a disturbing image in Doc's mind. It worked. My guardian shuddered and opened his mouth to tell me what I should have and could have done, but his voice died as something white and fluffy came fluttering down between us.

"Is that.. Snow?" Lightning asked in awe from behind me, staring at the tiny flake and trying to catch it to examine it. I caught it in my hand, but it melted. "Aw, Kelly…"

Another little flurry floated down, followed by another, and another. "It - it's snowing?" My observation came out more as a question than a statement. Lightning bent down to examine the white stuff on the ground.

"Hey, everybody!" Lightning called, straightening up and waving his arms, gesturing at the white stuff collecting on the ground. "It's snowing!"

Whoops sounded from around the cafe. Little kids jumped up, trying to catch the snow as it fell gently to the ground, the adults tried to protect the snow, and one kid tried to sled in the little snow that had already built up on the ground. A smile grew on my face as Andrea bounced up to me and grabbed me by the shoulders.

"It's snowing, it's snowing!" she shrieked, jumping up and down. I nodded, laughing happily.

"I know! It's really snowing!" I released her and twirled around in a circle, my arms extended. I didn't care if I looked like a fool - it was the first snows I had experienced in years, not including the fake snow incident from the other day.

The party continued, but with an even happier mood. DJ put on "Let It Snow", Flo brought out the snowflake shaped cookies, and we got enough snow to start a minor snowball fight between the kids. But the highlight of the night was when I saw Lightning give the necklace to Sally. She was completely speechless as he fastened it around her neck, but she was completely capable of turning around and kissing him senseless.

All in all, it was the best. Christmas Eve. EVER.

...

Hey guys! Sorry I didn't post this chapter Christmas Eve, Christmas, or yesterday, Boxing Day. I was working on it yesterday, but now it's past midnight, so yeah... Sorry, I've been super busy with the holidays. But I'll try to update this again maybe tomorrow, but in the meantime, I will be back to work on Different! Yay! More of Kelly the Crazy there, but less Kelly and Doc fluff. However, the solution to that will be in my Born This Way book. Unfortunately, that won't come out for a while... Keep reading Different for updates on that.

So, I hope you liked this chapter, and merry belated Christmas! Hope you guys all had a great day, and got lots and lots of presents. ;)

Reviews make my day - thanks for reading!

Kitty


	12. Chapter 12: Day Twelve

Okay, so most of the sledding part in this chapter actually happened to me and my friends when we went sledding last Friday. The hill was a good fifty feet tall, and something of a death trap. I wiped out on at least half of my runs... Still had a great time, though. :P

I don't own _Jingle Bells_ or _Poker Face_. I don't think anyone owns _Jingle Bells_, and Lady Gaga is the lucky owner of _Poker Face_.

...

**Thursday, December 25, 2014 - Christmas Day**

...

I ran out of my room to the living room window like a little kid to inspect the snow. My mouth fell open - we had a good four or five inches. I could have stared at it all day, but a frantic knocking on my door interrupted me. I ran out of the living room, not even looking at my stocking, or the presents under the tree - I was more excited about the snow than I was presents.

I whipped open the door. "Hey! Merry Christmas!" Andrea chirped, grinning as she jumped up and down a bit on the balls of her feet.

"Thanks, you too!"

"Isn't this great?" Andrea gestured to the snow, which was still lightly falling. I nodded, grinning.

"Totally! Here, just let me put on a coat, gloves, and grab some breakfast, then I'll be right out."

Andrea nodded. "Okay. Lightning's organizing a trip down to Willy's Butte to go sledding."

A huge grin covered my face. Sledding down the Butte? The seventy foot high Butte? Count me in! "Oh, heck, ya. That's _awesome_."

"Yeah. Meet you at Flo's?"

"Be there in fifteen."

"Okay."

I closed the door, still grinning as the dare-devil in me reared in excitement. I ran into the kitchen to find Doc flipping pancakes on the stove top. My eyes widened. Doc hardly ever cooked.

"Merry Christmas," I greeted him happily as I went up to him and gave him a hug. He wrapped an arm around me and kissed the top of my head, also a rare occasion.

"Merry Christmas to you, too," he said releasing me and going back to the pancakes. "Did you see the snow?"

"What snow?" I asked him, trying to act blank and unknowing, but a smirk of amusement slunk onto my face and into my voice. Doc snorted.

"You're a terrible liar, you know that?"

"Well, you never found out that I saw _Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part Two_ in theaters with Sal - Oh." In case you're wondering, _Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part Two_ came out when I was just barely eleven. I had wanted to see it, but Doc thought that it was too scary for me to see, at least in theaters. Sally, who had just gotten to Radiator Springs, took pity on me, her fellow Potterhead, and we went to the movies, claiming to be going to see _Rio_ again, then going out for dinner afterwards, but instead seeing Harry Potter. It was amazing.

Doc looked at me with a frown on his face, but there was amusement in his eyes. "What was that?"

"Nothing... I mean, wow, did you see the snow? There's like five inches. Holy crap. _Wow_."

Doc rolled his eyes. "I'll let you go today, but first thing tomorrow, I'm going to have to have a talk with you and Sally. Now, do you want to get some plates out?"

I nodded and walked to the cupboard where we kept our plates as I mentioned Lightning's sledding plan. "Do you wanna go?"

"Sure, sounds fun." I raised my eyebrows - I hadn't really expected Doc to say 'yes'. Guess Christmas put him into a good mood. Works for me.

"Okay, thanks." I set the table and Doc brought the pancakes over. I could normally just handle two, occasionally three, pancakes, but I knew Doc could down about five. I smirked as I remembered that one morning in Flo's when the men had gotten into one of those contests to see who could eat the most. Guido had been able to eat three pancakes, Luigi three and a half, Ramone four and a half, Doc and Lightning both had gotten to five and a quarter, Sheriff seven, and Mater just barely got to seven and a half. It had been funny for us women to watch the guys lie around, groaning about how stuffed they were. Then Shannon had had the amusing idea to inform Sheriff that Chick Hicks and the DHR were having a race. Sheriff had gotten up and started running to where Shannon had told him the race was to fine the five men for speeding. Lightning had followed because Chick was his enemy, Ramone had followed because he loved the DHR's fancily painted cars, and Mater had followed for amusement. Us women found it very funny to watch the men running up the street, huffing and puffing and clutching at their sides. We didn't find it as funny once they realized it was a trick, and decided to engage us in war - water balloon war. In March.

Doc and I enjoyed the pancakes before pulling on our coats, gloves, hats, and boots and heading over to Flo's. Lightning had gone to the trouble of going out of town to buy enough sleds for everyone, and I scored a blue snow boogie board. Laughing and talking loudly, we started off through the snow-filled roads towards Willy's Butte. 'We' were Shannon, Andrea, Lightning, Holley, Finn, and the original townsfolk of Radiator Springs, minus Lizzie and Red. I could see Holley and Mater walking together, holding hands. I smiled - they both deserved someone as nice as each other.

We reached the Butte, already sweating from the walk. "Someone should have cleared the roads, saved us some trouble," I complained to Shannon as we trekked through the snow to the top of the hill. She nodded.

"We could have used that snowplow we used to clear out the race stadium the other day." I smirked, remembering the explosive snow making machine.

"Oh, yeah, that'd be cool."

Finally, we all reached the top of the hill. I glanced down at the area where Lightning trained. Woah, that hill was steep...

"Ah, Lightning? You sure this is a good idea?" I asked him, staring down the butte. Lightning snickered.

"Wrong hill, Kell. We're going down the back so no one flips over and/or dies," he explained.

"Ooooooh. I knew that," I muttered as I trotted to the other side of the hill. Lightning snorted as I approached. We all silently inspected the back of the hill, which wasn't quite as steep as the front, but it seemed a bit bumpier.

"Alright, who wants to die - I mean go first?" Lightning announced. Silence.

"You were the one that organized this, you go first," Doc called. Lightning paled.

"Me?"

"You."

"I dunno about that, Doc..."

"Chicken," Mater teased. Lightning glared at him.

"I am not chicken!"

"Alright den... Baby."

"Mater!"

Holley and Sally smirked in amusement as their boyfriends argued about whether or not Lightning was chicken. Finally, I sighed and walked to the edge of the Butte and prepped myself. Then, I looked over my shoulder, saluted the others for good measure, and shouted, "See ya at the bottom, suckers!"

I pushed off and went speeding down the hill, squealing in excitement. The wind whipped my hair around in my face, and I had to spit some out of my mouth. Attractive. Snow also flew up in my face, and I could barely see where I was going. I shook the hair out of my face and realized I was heading straight for a cactus.

"Oh, crap," I muttered as I tried to swerved to the side. Course, I was on a sled, not in a car or whatever. The only choice I had to avoid the cactus was to sort of jump off my boogie board. I went tumbling to the side, getting snow down my coat in the process. I missed the cactus, though, which was good. I popped up out of the snow with my arms raised. "Ta-da!" I bowed.

"Nice!" Lightning yelled down sarcastically, laughing. Then, Sally pushed him, and he went tumbling down the hill a few feet. "What the - Sally!"

Sally laughed and jumped onto her sled, then went speeding past her boyfriend, who had a bit of the white snow piled on his red hair. "Merry Christmas!" She called to him, laugh. A moment later, the blonde came gliding to a stop beside me. "That was fun."

"I know, right?" I helped her up and we walked to the side of the hill as some more people went sledding down the hill. I went down a few more times the regular way before I started to get bored.

"Yo, Shannon, Andrea!" I yelled as my two friends came trekking up the side of the hill. Shannon looked up.

"Yeah?"

I tossed my snow boogie board aside and grabbed a big plastic orange sled. "Let's go down together!"

"It's not gonna work," Shannon pointed out as she looked down the hill. "It's too steep."

"Whatever," Andrea shrugged as she pulled me and the sled to the front of the hill. "Shannon sits in front, then Kelly, then me."

"Okay," I said. "Get on, Shan."

"It's not gonna work," Shannon repeated, but she sat down anyways. I sat behind her, and Andrea sat behind me.

"Ready?" Andrea asked.

"Yup."

"It's not gonna work."

"Let's go," Andrea declared as she pushed us off, and we went screaming down the hillside. About halfway down, the sled leaned to the right, and we went tumbling off into a big pile.

"Told ya," Shannon bragged, but she was laughing as she pulled herself out of the pile.

"Let's do that again!" Andrea cheered from underneath me. Laughing hysterically, I rolled over to let her up. Oh my gosh, that had been so fun, and hilarious, too... Andrea and I just lay there for a few minutes, giggling uncontrollably until Shannon took the sled and walked back up the hill. We managed to pull ourselves together and tried again, with no more luck.

"Okay, so we all know we're going to just wipe out again, so let's jazz it up," I suggested. Shannon gave me a '_what the heck?_' look. "Let's sing _Jingle Bells!_"

"Yeah!" Andrea agreed happily.

"No, that's stupid," Shannon rolled her eyes, but she still got on the sled. I went next, then Andrea.

"On my mark... Three... Two... _One!_" Shannon, Andrea and I belted out about half the chorus before wiping out. "Oh my gosh, that was awesome!"

"Let's do it again!" Andrea tried to hopped up, but her boot was tangled in the rope, along with mine, and she just fell back down. On me.

"ANDREA, OW!" I yelled, but I was laughing as Andrea jumped back up and, of course, fell back down face first in the snow. After a few minutes, Shannon got us untangled, and we brainstormed on what we should sing on our next ride on the way up the hill. "How about _Poker Face_?"

Shannon made a face - she wasn't fond of Lady Gaga. "Why that song?"

"Just because. We could sing something by Justin Beaver, I gu -"

"NO!_ Poker Face_ is fine!"_  
_

I grinned mischievously as we reached the top of the hill and waited for Fillmore to get out of the way before we got ready to go down again. I counted down again, and we went flying down the hill, singing - well, howling, really - the chorus of_ Poker Face_.

Of course, we crashed halfway down, but I just stood up and kept singing until Shannon finally got tired of me and my poker face, and shoved me into the snow. She walked off to grab a snow board that Lightning had found as I, spitting out snow, lifted myself out of the snow. "Well, next time you don't like my singing, a simple "please shut up!" would work, too, ya know!"

"Don't caaare!" Shannon called back in a sing-song voice. I rolled my eyes.

"You wanna go down again?" I asked Andrea as I stood up, brushing snow off myself.

"Sure," she said. She looked around for another partner. "Hey, Sally!"

Sally looked over and noticed that Shannon was gone, and that we needed another person. "Oh, Lord..." she muttered. "Erm... Sorry, I was just about to go down with Lightning!"

Lightning turned around, a question just forming on his lips, when Sally gave him a quick kiss to shut him up, shoved him onto a sled, and then jumped on herself. I rolled my eyes as they went sailing over the snow.

"I'll go with you," Holley volunteered as she walked up the side of the hill, brushing a dark brown curl out of her vivid green eyes and tossing her current sled to the side. "But how about we wait until Sally gets back up here, then make her come down with us?"

"I don't know if this sled will hold four," I mused, looking the orange plastic sled over. Holley grinned devilishly. A first - I hadn't known that Holley had a bit of a mischievous side to her. Today was just full of surprises.

"Guess we'll find out. Come on, I knew where the slopes are the least bumpy," Holley guided Andrea and me over to the center of the hill. I looked down the hill and noticed a cactus smack in the center of our future path lounging at the bottom of the hill.

"Uh, Holley, there's a cactus right there," I pointed out.

"We're never going to get that far down," she assured me.

"Fair point," I agreed as I sat down on the sled. Andrea sat down behind me, then Holley, and we waited for Sally. Once she reached the top of the hill, Holley called out to her.

"Sally! We saved you a seat!" she proclaimed. Sally looked over at us and her eyes widened.

"What? Are you nuts? That's, like, a two person sled, and this hill is a danger zone! Do you know what those put together equal? A death trap!"

"Come on, it'll be fun," Holley encouraged.

"No, it won't, it'll be painful," Sally argued, her arms crossed.

Holley rolled her eyes and reached into her pocket. "I didn't want to do this... But if you don't come willingly, we'll have to take you by force."

Lightning was busting a gut from behind Sally, and she glared. "Thanks for the help, Stickers," she glowered half-heartedly as Holley took out her taser. Sally spotted it and yelped. "I'm coming, I'm coming!"

Sally sat down on the sled. "Scoot up, please." I sighed and scooted up a bit, nearly falling off the front of the sled. Andrea followed my example, as did Holley, and Sally had enough room to be satisfied. "Okay. Ready to die?"

"YEAH!"

"I WAS BORN TO DIE!" Andrea hollered to the skies.

""You never feel more alive than when you're almost dead"," Holley quoted Finn as we pushed off.

I tried to sing_ Let It Go_ from Frozen for no good reason, but just ended up screaming in laughter as we went crashing down the hill. Andrea was squealing, Sally was yelling, "I told you we'd - OOF - die!" and Holley was laughing at Sally.

We hit a bump and all of us besides Sally went flying off the sled. Andrea went flying into Shannon, who was attempting to snowboard, Holley nearly got run over by Guido (course, Guido was, like, miniature sized, so that wouldn't have been too bad if he had ran into her), and I just landed on my side and went rolling down the hill, just barely missing the cactus. The only one who made it down the hill safely was, ironically, Sally. She got up and looked at the slight chaos Andrea, Holley, and I had a created on the hill.

"You were right, Holley, that was fun! Wanna do it again?"

"I'm good."

Laughing, we got up, and the four of us made our way back up the hill, holding onto each other for support. Shannon also walked back up, giving us some looks that clearly stated that she was concerned for our sanity.

Andrea and I took a break at the top of the hill to watch Shannon snowboard. Despite never having lessons, she was really good. She, Lightning, Finn, and Holley were having a contest to see who could snowboard the best. Holley claimed to have had lessons when she was younger, but they obviously hadn't stuck with her.

After a few runs, Shannon made it to the bottom of the hill without wiping out. "AHA! TAKE THAT, SUCKERS!" she gloated as a flailing Lightning ran into her. "ARGH! LIGHTNING!"

I'm assuming that Lightning, who was now lying on top of Shannon (aaaawwwkwaaaard...), apologized as he stood up, but I couldn't here from all the way up the hill. Plus, I was too busy dying of laughter.

At one point, I decided to randomly slid down the hill on my butt. No sled. Just pure butt-power. By the end of my run, my behind was freezing cold and wet, but I was laughing. Holley decided to challenge my awesomeness and go down surf-style on that orange sled, but she made it about five feet before wiping out.

"You know what, I've decided I don't feel like doing that just yet," she announced from under a pile of snow. Mater went to help dig her out, laughing. Finn tried it, and made it successfully to the bottom of the hill. He stepped off the sled neatly, turned to face a flabbergasted Holley, and bowed, sending Shannon, Andrea, Lightning, Sally, and me into hysterics.

Holley's response was to bend down, scoop up a snowball, and send it flying at Mr. British Intelligence. He ducked, only to receive another one in the mustache. "Oh my gosh, sorry, Finn, I didn't mean to hit you in the - EEP!" Holley's apology was interrupted by a flurry of snowballs from Finn. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I SAID I WAS SORRY ALREADY!"

Suddenly, it broke out into a huge snowball war, everyone versus everyone. It was amazing. I managed to hit about ninety percent of my targets. Eventually, I realized it was down to Finn, Holley, and me. "Oh, crap," I muttered as I slowly stepped out of the danger zone, leaving the fight to Holley and Finn. Holley tried to fight back against all the snowballs, but it was no use.

"I SURRENDER, I SURRENDER!" Holley shrieked, trying to shield her face. Instantly the snowballs stopped, and she groaned and flopped over into the snow. "Good Lord, Finn."

"You okay, Holley?" Mater called, amusement lingering in his voice.

"I'VE JUST BEEN BEATEN BY AN OLD GUY WITH A MUSTACHE. I AM _NOT_ OKAY."

Everyone burst into laughter, and Finn pretended to be hurt. "That hurts, Miss Shiftwell."

"You know what hurts? My face."

"Do you need an ambulance?" Andrea called out teasingly, and that gave me an idea.

"Lightning, grab the orange sled!" I called. He grabbed the sled and walked over to Holley with me. I pushed her over onto it.

"Kelly, what are - " Holley started to ask as she tried to sit up, but Lightning and I took off down the side of the hill, and she fell back over.

"BEE-DO, BEE-DO, BEE-DO!" I yelled, mimicking the fire-fighter Minion from Despicable Me 2. Behind me, Shannon and Andrea joined in, along with a few other people that had seen Despicable Me 2, including Mater and Lightning. Holley was lounging in the sled, laughing as Lightning and I pulled her into town. The few people that were outside were staring at us as if we were nuts, but we didn't care.

"WE'RE NOT CRAZY!" Shannon shouted to them reassuringly. We stopped at Flo's, and Holley rolled out. The snow plow still hadn't come through, but we were all used to the snow by now. Our faces had repeatedly become acquainted with it.

"Who wants hot chocolate?" Flo called as we entered the cafe.

She was instantly greeted by a round of "ME!"s, and we all mobbed the cafe. Soaking wet and laughing, Sally and I went into the kitchen to help Flo make a mass quantity of hot chocolate. When Flo wasn't looking, I added some chocolate to the mixture. A little extra chocolate never killed anyone, right?

We brought out the hot chocolate, and Lightning, acting like the little kid we all know he really is, yelled, "CHOCOLAAAATE!" practically causing a stampede. I ducked back into the kitchen and grabbed some whipped cream and marshmallows.

"Okay, the marshmallows are for if you wanna go classic, the whipped cream is for you people with a desire for a heavy sugar rush, and if you're super crazy, you can have both," I announced as I walked out, juggling five cans of whipped cream with three packages of marshmallows. "Lightning, I know you'll want both. Same with you, Shannon."

"What about Andrea?" Shannon asked as she grabbed some marshmallows and dumped them into her mug of steaming hot chocolate.

"I don't like marshmallows," Andrea said casually. Shannon gasped, and nearly dropped her cup.

"YOU WHAT?!" she shrieked. Andrea shrank back.

"I don't like marshmallows..."

"What is there to dislike about marshmallows?!"

"I just don't like the way they feel," Andrea confessed. Shannon facepalmed, but let the subject drop.

...

Later that day, Doc and I retired to our house for some bonding time and our small gift exchange. We had a tradition of filling each other stockings, and I had put the cookies Flo and I had baked into his stocking, plus the book under the tree. I'll admit that I wasn't a great gift-wrapper, but my present didn't look too bad. Mainly because I had asked Holley to do it for me. Turns out that Holley Shiftwell can hack into the government's files and easily procure as much as information as needed, then get out before her presence is noticed, but she could just barely wrap a decent present. I teased her by saying I would give her a guide to wrapping presents as a gift, and she retorted that she in return would give me a lesson in hacking.

I grabbed my present for Doc and sat on the couch, handing my guardian the gift. "Sorry it's not much," I apologized as he opened it. He studied it for a moment.

"Thanks, sweetheart. I've been wanting this for a long time now, but I couldn't find it anywhere," he reached over and gave me another hug, and I smiled. I could get used to that. "Where'd you find it?"

"The bookstore in Jackson."

Doc pulled away and gave me a disbelieving look. "Really?"

"Yeah..."

Doc facepalmed. "I've been there, what, seven times? And I've never found it."

"Have you thought about asking a store employee?"

"...Maybe..."

I didn't mention that it had been Lightning who found it and just laughed a bit as Doc stood up. "I'll be right back," he said and he walked out of the room. I looked at the fire crackling in the fire place, grateful that I had been able to get Doc to open his stocking before he put the fire in, otherwise his cookies would be a mess by now, as would be the giant Hershey's chocolate bars he had gotten me. A minute later, Doc reentered the room, holding a large, red box with a green bow on top. I was instantly curious.

"What's that?" I questioned as Doc set it on the ground. He sat down on the floor by the box, grinning.

"Well, open it and find out," he said. I smiled in excitement as I slid off the couch and crouched on the floor. I carefully lifted the top of the box off and was greeted by a little yip. I gasped and quickly set the box top on the ground, then reached into the box and scooped out the little brown puppy.

"Oh my gosh," I breathed as the puppy squirmed around in my arms and tried to lick my face. "She's so cute! I love her! She is a she, though, right?"

Doc laughed. "Yes, it's a girl."

"What's her name?"

"That's up to you."

"I dunno... Wow, she's crazy," I laughed as the puppy squirmed around some more, trying to get out of my arms, but I wasn't sure if I should let her go. No need for her to go do her business under the tree. "It's like she has a sugar rush or something..." I glanced at the Hershey bars on the coffee table, and grinned as the perfect name came to me. "Can I call her Hershey?"

Doc smiled and reached over the rub the puppy's ears. She nuzzled into his touch. "Sure. Sounds perfect."

I scooted closer to Doc and gave him a hug, almost squashing Hershey between us. "Thanks so much," I thanked him again. He squeezed me.

"My pleasure."

"I love you." The words escaped my mouth before I had a chance to think about whether or not I should say them. Doc and I had never exchanged those words to each other before, and I wasn't sure how he'd react.

"I love you, too."

I smiled at his response, wishing I could just freeze time right then and there. The moment was perfect. Just me, Doc, and Hershey. Together. A family.

My family.

...

The sledding thing where Andrea, Shannon, and Kelly went down all together actually happened to me and my two friends. We kept wiping out, and we also attempted to sing_ Jingle Bells_ and _Poker Face_. I also wiped out pretty badly and stood up and bowed (I swear some people had been staring at me, the wipe out was that bad, but I was fine). My brother had a worse wipe-out at the end of the sledding trip, so we girls ushered him onto a sled and rushed him to the car, screaming, "BEE-DOO, BEE-DOO, BEE-DOO!" We got a lot of stares, and one of my friends yelled to the onlookers "WE'RE NOT CRAZY!" My bro was fine, though.

Hope you guys liked this chapter! This was unfortunately the last one, but I think it was pretty great. :) I loved writing it.

Thanks for the forty-one reviews on chapters 1 through 11! I hope you guys all had a great New Year's, and that your year will be filled with peace, joy, and chocolate. Lots of chocolate.

Happy New Year!

Kitty


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